HTML Entity Decoder & Encoder API - Named, Numeric & Emoji

HTML Entity Encoder & Decoder — named, hex, decimal, emoji-aware

Encode text to HTML entities or decode entities back to characters, with auto-direction. Handles named entities (&, ©), decimal/hex numeric references, and non-ASCII/emoji via code points. Bulk-capable. $0.0004 per operation. Empty input is uncharged.

What you get

• Encode: escapes & < > " ', maps common symbols to named entities, non-ASCII to numeric refs.
• Decode: resolves named, decimal (é), and hex (é) references.
• Auto: decodes if entities are present, else encodes.
• Emoji-safe: iterates by code point (surrogate pairs handled).
• Bulk: up to 200 strings per run.

Input

{ "items": [ { "input": "<a>café & co</a>", "direction": "encode" }, { "input": "&lt;b&gt;", "direction": "decode" } ] }

Output (real run, 2026-08-07)

{
  "ok": true,
  "input": "<a href=\"x\">café & co</a>",
  "direction": "encode",
  "output": "&lt;a href=&quot;x&quot;&gt;caf&#233; &amp; co&lt;/a&gt;"
}

Example

A real run on 2026-10-31 with the input this page's form is prefilled with:

{
  "input": "Café & <co> — \"100% smörgåsbord\" 🚀"
}

It finished in 1 second and returned 1 result. It was charged for 1 operation-run event ($0.0004 on the Free plan). The first result (long text and lists cut for display):

{
  "ok": true,
  "input": "Café & <co> — \"100% smörgåsbord\" 🚀",
  "direction": "encode",
  "output": "Caf&#233; &amp; &lt;co&gt; &mdash; &quot;100% sm&#246;rg&#229;sbord&quot; &#128640;"
}

Pricing — $0.0004 per operation

Priced at the floor. No comparable HTML-entity encoder/decoder actor was found on the Apify Store on 2026-08-07 (the "entity" search returns unrelated scrapers), so there is no competitor price to quote.

Limits (honest ones)

• Up to 200 items per run.
• Encoding maps a curated set of symbols to named entities and everything else non-ASCII to numeric references; it does not emit every possible named entity.
• Unknown named entities on decode are left untouched (lossless, never corrupted).

FAQ

• Does it handle emoji and accents? Yes — non-ASCII encodes to numeric references and decodes back exactly.
• Named or numeric entities? Encoding prefers named for common symbols, numeric otherwise; decoding accepts all three forms.
• How does auto work? If the string contains an entity reference it decodes, otherwise it encodes.
• Bulk? Yes — up to 200 strings, one charge each.

Use from code or AI agents

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/EliAI~html-entity-converter/runs?token=YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H 'content-type: application/json' \
  -d '{"input":"<b>café & co</b>"}'

Callable as an agent tool through the Apify MCP server (mcp.apify.com).

Who uses it

• Email template developers encoding accented characters and symbols into entities that survive old mail clients
• Scraping engineers decoding &, ' and hex references left in extracted product titles
• CMS migration teams cleaning double-encoded entities from exported article bodies in batch
• Frontend developers escaping user-facing text with emoji before inserting it into legacy HTML
• Data analysts decoding entity-laden text fields in a CSV export before analysis

Changelog

• 2026-11-01: Page text only: an Example section from a real run. Code, output and price are unchanged.