Arabic text
Bidi Control Characters Cleaner
Find and remove the hidden direction marks and zero-width characters that sneak into copied text.
Runs in your browser; nothing is uploaded. · Free, no account · 1 min
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How to use
- Paste the text that behaves oddly or fails to match.
- Read the table of hidden characters found, with their code points and positions.
- Choose which groups to remove: marks, embeddings, isolates, zero-width characters.
- Copy the cleaned text, or turn on the visible tags to see where each character was.
What it checks and how it works
The Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm (UAX #9) defines invisible control characters that steer the direction of text: the marks LRM, RLM and ALM, the embeddings and overrides LRE, RLE, PDF, LRO and RLO, and the isolates LRI, RLI, FSI and PDI. Zero-width space, word joiner, byte-order mark and soft hyphen also travel in copied text. They do not show, but they break exact matches, URLs, file names and counts.
The tool lists every one it finds and removes the groups you choose. ZWNJ and ZWJ change how letters join, so they stay unless you ask, which matters for Persian and Urdu. W3C recommends markup or CSS for direction where you control the page, with control characters for plain text.
Sources
- Unicode Standard Annex #9: Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm opened 29 Oct 2026
- W3C Internationalization: When to use Unicode control characters instead of markup opened 29 Oct 2026
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Questions
About this tool
They come from copying out of chat apps, PDFs, word processors and web pages that insert direction marks to display mixed Arabic and English correctly.
Usually, for identifiers such as URLs, names and keywords. In text meant to be read, removing them can change how a mixed Arabic and English line displays, so check the result.
They can be used to make text look different from what it is. If you receive code or a link with direction overrides, inspect it with this tool before you trust it.
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