Remove Words and Characters
Strip chosen words, letters, digits or punctuation out of a block of text. Runs entirely in your browser.
What each option does
| Option | Effect |
|---|---|
| Words | A comma-separated list. Each entry is removed wherever it appears. An entry containing spaces is matched as a phrase. |
| Characters | Every character you type here is removed individually. #@* removes all three, anywhere they occur. |
| Whole words only | Requires the match to start and end at a word boundary, so removing cat leaves catalogue alone. |
| Case sensitive | Off by default, so The and the are both removed. Switch it on when case carries meaning. |
| Remove digits | Strips every digit, including those inside words such as a1b2. |
| Remove punctuation | Strips every punctuation and symbol character using the Unicode categories, so typographic quotes and dashes are covered as well as ASCII marks. |
| Tidy up spacing | Collapses the double spaces left behind by a removal and trims each line. On by default. |
Whole words matters more than it looks
This is the option that decides whether the tool does what you meant. Removing cat with whole words on leaves catalogue, concatenate and category untouched, because the match has to begin and end at a word boundary. With it off, the same removal turns catalogue into alogue and concatenate into conenate. Leave it on unless you are deliberately stripping a fragment such as a prefix.
Typing punctuation in the words field is safe
Anything you type is escaped before it is used to search, so a full stop, an asterisk, a question mark or a bracket is treated as that character and removed literally. None of it is read as pattern syntax, which means you cannot accidentally write something that deletes far more than you asked for.
Spacing after a removal
Taking a word out of the middle of a sentence leaves the spaces that sat on either side of it, so the quick brown fox minus quick would otherwise read the brown fox. Tidy up spacing collapses those and trims the ends of each line. Turn it off when the spacing in your text is deliberate, such as an indented list or an ASCII table.
Examples
Stripping filler words from a draft
Put very, really, just, actually, basically in the words field with whole words on. The draft comes back without the hedges, and the word count at the bottom shows exactly how much shorter it got.
Cleaning scraped data
Text pulled from a page often arrives with markers such as #, * and stray pipes. Type those into the characters field and they disappear in one pass, while Remove digits clears any row numbers that came along with it.
Preparing text for a word-frequency count
Switch on Remove punctuation and Remove digits, and list the common stop words in the words field. What remains is the vocabulary of the piece, which is a reasonable starting point for spotting the terms a page actually leans on.
How to use it
Paste your text into the upper box and fill in whatever you want removed above it. The result updates as you type in either field, so you can see the effect of a removal before committing to it. Copy result puts it on the clipboard, Download .txt saves it as a file, and Use result as input moves the output back up so you can run a second, different removal over it.
Questions
How do I remove more than one word at a time?
Separate them with commas in the words field. Spaces around each comma are ignored, so the, and, of works the same as the,and,of. A phrase containing spaces is matched as a phrase, so New York removes only that pair together.
What does whole words only change?
With it on, removing cat leaves catalogue untouched because the match must start and end at a word boundary. With it off, the letters are removed wherever they appear, which turns catalogue into alogue. Leave it on unless you are deliberately stripping a fragment.
Can I remove punctuation without listing every mark?
Yes. The Remove punctuation option strips every punctuation and symbol character in one pass, using the Unicode punctuation categories rather than a fixed list, so typographic quotes, dashes and non-English marks are covered too.
What happens to the spaces left behind?
Removing a word from the middle of a sentence leaves two spaces where it was. Tidy up spacing, on by default, collapses those back to one and trims the ends of each line, so the result reads normally without a second pass.
Is regular expression punctuation safe to type?
Yes. Everything you type is escaped before it is used, so characters such as a full stop, asterisk or bracket are treated as themselves and removed literally. They are never interpreted as pattern syntax.
Related: Remove Line Breaks for layout problems and Word Counter to measure the difference. Everything else is on the all tools page.
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