Social Media Character Counter

X's Unique Counting Rules: 2 Chars for CJK, 23 for Links

The reason the same post gets cut off on one platform but not another is that X (formerly Twitter) counts characters differently from everyone else.

X counts CJK characters (like Korean, Chinese, and Japanese) and emoji as 2 characters each. English letters, numbers, and basic symbols count as 1. This means a post written entirely in Korean has an effective limit of 140 characters, not 280. Also, X counts all links as exactly 23 characters, regardless of their actual length, because it automatically shortens them using its t.co service. That's why there's no need to use a URL shortener for X. This tool calculates character counts the same way, so the numbers you see on the cards will match what happens when you actually post.

Instagram, Threads, YouTube, and Kakao count Korean characters as 1 character and links by their literal length. This means posts with long links are actually at an advantage on X, but at a disadvantage on Instagram.

What Matters More Than the Limit: The 'See More' Fold

Long before you hit the character limit, your post will get truncated by a "See More" link. This is what actually determines if your content gets read.

Instagram captions only show the first couple of lines in the feed; the rest is hidden behind "more." Observations suggest the cutoff is around the first 125 characters, but it varies with line breaks and device. You can use all 2,200 characters, but if the first two lines are boring, nobody will tap to expand.

YouTube descriptions only show the first two or three lines below the video player, and only the beginning is visible in search result snippets. Put your links and key sentences at the very beginning. The 100-character YouTube title is also cut off much earlier in search results and recommendation cards.

So there's only one rule of thumb: put the core message first and the hashtags last. This tool counts hashtags separately for a reason—to help you see if they're pushing your main content out of view.

Click a Card → Check the Excess → Trim to Fit

This tool highlights the overflow in your text based on the selected platform's rules. When you first load the page, it defaults to the rules for X.

1. Paste your text and check the cards for any numbers in red. The number shows characters remaining; it will turn negative (e.g., -12) if you're over the limit.
2. Click the card for the platform that's over the limit. The preview below will highlight the portion that will be cut off in red.
3. Look at the red highlighted section and decide what to edit. Hashtags and filler adjectives are usually the first to go.
4. If you're in a hurry, click "Trim to Fit." This will instantly delete the excess text based on the selected platform's limit.

How the Statistics Are Calculated

• Total Characters — This is based on Unicode codepoints. A single emoji counts as 1 character. However, composite emoji, like flags or family emoji, which are made of multiple codepoints, may be counted as 2 or more.
• Hashtags — The tool only recognizes a '#' that appears at the beginning of a line or after a space or parenthesis. It captures tags containing Korean, English, numbers, and underscores. A '#' in the middle of a word (e.g., C#) is not counted as a tag.
• Mentions — Only counts mentions that start with '@' following a space and are followed by English letters, numbers, periods, or underscores. It will not detect usernames containing Korean characters.
• URL — A string is considered a link if it starts with http://, https://, or www. A domain like example.com without a scheme or `www` prefix will not be counted as a URL and will be excluded from X's 23-character rule. Always include `https://` to ensure your links are counted correctly.
• UTF-8 Bytes — One Korean character is 3 bytes. This value is only relevant for systems with byte-based limits, like SMS or some developer APIs. It is not related to the character limits of the platforms on the cards.