String Escape / Unescape (JavaScript, Java, C#, Python, Go, PHP, Bash)

Every language has its own rules for writing special characters inside a string: JavaScript and Java use \n and \uXXXX, C# reads up to four hex digits after \x, C reads every hex digit, Go treats \x as a byte, PHP only escapes in double quotes, and shells need completely different tricks. This tool escapes plain text into a correct literal for the language you pick, and unescapes a literal back into the text it stands for, following each language's own grammar.

How to use this tool

1. Paste the text, or the string literal you want to decode.
2. Choose Escape or Unescape.
3. Pick the language and quote style, such as Python '…' or C# verbatim @"…".
4. For escaping, optionally turn non-ASCII characters into escapes and add the quotes.
5. Copy the result.

Formula

escape: \ → \\ · quote → \" · line break → \n · tab → \t · control characters → \x, \u or octal per language

Unescaping follows each grammar: JavaScript accepts \x, \u, \u{…}, line continuations and legacy octal; Java octal up to \377 and \uXXXX; C# \x with 1–4 digits and \U; C and Go octal/hex escapes are bytes decoded as UTF-8; Python keeps the backslash of unknown escapes; PHP and Bash keep unknown escapes as written. Escapes that a language rejects (Java \q, Go \') are reported with their line and column. When unescaping, surrounding quotes and prefixes such as @, r or $ are removed automatically.

Example

The sample has quotes, a line break, a tab and Windows backslashes. As a JavaScript "…" literal it becomes Line 1: \"quotes\" and 'apostrophes'\nLine 2:\tC:\\Users\\Ada — café 😀 — the apostrophes stay because the string uses double quotes. Unescaping the C# text \x41BC gives the single character 䆼 (U+41BC), not "ABC", because C# reads four hex digits.