Free online HTML to TEXT converter

A text-only importer, script, or archival system may reject an HTML file because it expects unformatted characters. Converting the file to .txt removes markup and styling, producing a smaller file that is easier to search, edit, and exchange.

What the HTML format is

HTML (HyperText Markup Language) stores a document's structure and content with elements such as <p>, <h1>, <a>, and <table>. CSS controls presentation, while JavaScript can add behavior. Browsers display HTML, and website editors, content-management systems, email applications, documentation tools, and code editors can create or export it. Files normally use the .html or .htm extension.

What the TEXT format is

A plain-text file normally uses the .txt extension and the text/plain media type. It contains characters without HTML tags, fonts, colors, images, page layout, or interactive behavior. Notepad, TextEdit, Vim, command-line tools, database importers, email systems, and most operating systems can open it.

Plain text is useful for logs, notes, source-data exchange, accessibility workflows, version control, and long-term archiving. Its advantages are small file size, broad compatibility, and simple searching. Headings, paragraphs, and list items can remain readable, but their visual formatting cannot be preserved.

How to convert HTML to TEXT

Using 101convert: Open the HTML-to-TEXT converter on 101convert.com, add the .html or .htm file, start the conversion, and download the resulting .txt file. This requires no installed software. Do not upload confidential or regulated content unless the service's data-handling terms meet your requirements.

Using Pandoc: Install Pandoc, open a terminal or command prompt in the source-file folder, and run:

pandoc input.html -t plain -o output.txt

Replace the filenames as needed; use full paths when the file is in another folder. Pandoc converts common headings, paragraphs, lists, quotations, and other structural elements into plain-text equivalents. To avoid automatic line wrapping, you can use:

pandoc input.html -t plain --wrap=none -o output.txt

Using LibreOffice: Open the file with File → Open, choose File → Save As, select Text (.txt), and confirm the export. If an encoding dialog appears, choose UTF-8. This option lets you inspect the document's rendered content before saving.

Using a browser: Open the local HTML file, select the required visible content, copy it, paste it into a plain-text editor, and save it as output.txt. This is practical for a short page but can include navigation and other visible interface elements, omit hidden content, and change spacing.

Quality and compatibility limits

Plain text cannot represent images, video, forms, scripts, CSS layout, colors, font choices, or interactive behavior. Tables may become uneven columns, and multi-column layouts may appear in an unexpected order. Links commonly become their visible labels instead of clickable links; preserve URLs separately or use a converter option or parser designed to include them.

HTML source does not always contain the content shown in a browser. Pages that build their text with JavaScript may produce little useful output when processed directly by Pandoc or another source-based converter. Render such pages in a browser and copy the result, or use a tool that supports the required page behavior.

Save the result as UTF-8 to retain accented characters, symbols, and non-Latin scripts. Older applications may require Windows-1252 or another legacy encoding; using the wrong encoding can cause garbled characters. Check the converted file in the program that will consume it, especially when line endings, tab-separated data, or exact column positions matter.