Detect invisible and hidden Unicode characters in any text. See highlighted markers in a live preview, view character names and code points, and find out exactly what is hiding in your copy before it causes formatting or SEO issues.
Invisible characters are highlighted in red below. Detection runs live in your browser.
No invisible characters detected.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is an Invisible Character Detector?
An Invisible Character Detector scans text for hidden Unicode symbols that do not appear on screen — zero-width spaces, byte order marks, soft hyphens, and non-breaking spaces. It highlights them and shows their exact code points.
Why do invisible characters cause problems?
They can break search indexing, cause duplicate content issues, break URLs and code, and make identical-looking strings fail to match. They often sneak in when copying from PDFs, Word, or websites.
How do I remove invisible characters?
After detecting them here, use the Ghost Character & Formatting Cleaner to strip them from your text automatically.
Is my text stored or sent anywhere?
No. All detection runs entirely in your browser. Your text never leaves your device.
Is this tool free and does it work on mobile?
Yes on both counts. The Invisible Character Detector on draft21 is completely free with no sign-up required and works on all devices.