HTML to Plain Text

Paste HTML markup to extract readable plain text. Preserve links as Markdown syntax or convert the full HTML to Markdown.

HTML Input
Plain Text Output
Paste HTML above to extract plain text.

How to Use the HTML to Plain Text Converter

  1. Choose a mode — Extract strips all tags, Preserve Links keeps anchor tags as Markdown, Markdown converts common HTML elements to Markdown syntax.
  2. Paste your HTML into the left input area. The converted output appears instantly on the right.
  3. Copy or download the result using the buttons above the output area.

How HTML to Text Extraction Works

This tool uses the browser's built-in DOMParser API to safely parse HTML without executing any JavaScript in it. The parsed document's body text content is then extracted using DOM traversal. Unlike simple regex-based stripping (which can fail on malformed HTML, nested tags, or encoded entities), the DOMParser approach handles all valid HTML correctly because it uses the same parser that the browser uses to render web pages. Script and style tag contents are explicitly removed before extraction so that inline JavaScript and CSS do not appear in the output.

Extract Mode

Extract mode produces clean plain text suitable for feeding into text analysis tools, storing in plain-text databases, generating RSS descriptions, or pasting into plain-text email clients. The tool preserves meaningful whitespace by inserting line breaks at block-level elements (div, p, h1-h6, li, br, tr, blockquote, pre) so that the structure of the original document is maintained in the plain text output. Multiple consecutive blank lines are collapsed to a maximum of two to avoid excessive whitespace.

Preserve Links Mode

Preserve Links mode converts all anchor tags to Markdown link syntax before stripping the remaining HTML. This is especially useful for extracting article content from web pages while keeping the hyperlinks intact in a format that can be re-rendered or parsed. The output format is [link text](href) for each anchor tag. Links with empty text content or href attributes are omitted. This mode is commonly used by content aggregation pipelines and email formatters that display HTML content in Markdown-aware environments.

Markdown Conversion Mode

Markdown mode performs a more comprehensive conversion, mapping common HTML elements to their Markdown equivalents. Heading tags (h1 through h6) become the corresponding number of hash symbols. Bold (strong, b) becomes double asterisks. Italic (em, i) becomes single asterisks. Unordered lists (ul/li) become dash-prefixed items. Ordered lists (ol/li) become numbered items. Code and pre blocks become backtick-fenced sections. Blockquotes become greater-than-prefixed lines. All remaining HTML tags are stripped. The output can be used directly in Markdown editors, GitHub README files, documentation systems, or any Markdown-aware platform. For the reverse operation (Markdown to HTML), try our HTML ↔ Markdown Converter or Markdown Preview tool.

Frequently Asked Questions

This tool uses the browser's built-in DOMParser to parse the HTML into a document object, then reads the text content while stripping all tags. Paragraph breaks are preserved by detecting block-level elements before extraction.
Preserve Links mode converts anchor tags to Markdown link syntax: [link text](url). The rest of the HTML is stripped to plain text. This is useful for extracting article content while keeping hyperlinks in a readable format.
Markdown mode converts h1-h6 headings to # prefixes, bold/strong to **text**, italic/em to *text*, links to [text](url), lists to - or numbered items, code/pre to backtick blocks, and blockquotes to > lines. All other tags are stripped.
No. All processing is done entirely in your browser using the built-in DOMParser API. Your HTML code never leaves your device. There is no server, no network request, and no data logging.
In Extract mode, all HTML tags are stripped. Script and style tag contents are also removed. In Preserve Links mode, anchor tags become Markdown links. In Markdown mode, common structural elements are converted; all other tags are stripped.