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Free Text Truncator

Truncate text to a maximum length, with word-boundary-aware cutting and a custom suffix.

100% Free No Signup Works on all devices

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Truncating text to fit a length limit is easy to get wrong by hand — cutting off mid-word looks sloppy, and forgetting to reserve room for a suffix like "..." can push the result over the actual limit.

This tool truncates text to a specified maximum length, with an option to cut cleanly at the last word boundary rather than mid-word.

How it works

Enter your text, the maximum length, a truncation style, and an optional suffix. The tool reserves room for the suffix, cuts the text at the limit (or at the last word boundary if that style is chosen), and appends the suffix — leaving text under the limit untouched.

  1. Enter text.
  2. Enter max length.
  3. Enter truncation style.
  4. Enter suffix.
  5. Click Calculate to see your results.

Examples

Truncating to 20 characters at a word boundary

"This is a longer piece of text that might need to be shortened." truncated to 20 characters at a word boundary becomes "This is a longer..." — cut cleanly at the last full word rather than mid-word.

Who should use it

  • Truncating article excerpts or meta descriptions to a display length limit.
  • Shortening text to fit a character-limited field like a title or tooltip.

Industry applications

  • Content management and SEO
  • UI/UX text formatting

Advantages

  • Correctly reserves room for the suffix within the specified limit.
  • Supports both word-boundary and hard-cut truncation styles.

Limitations

  • Word-boundary truncation may cut noticeably short of the limit if the last word before it is long.

Common mistakes to avoid

  • Manually truncating text without reserving room for the "..." suffix, causing the final result to exceed the intended limit.
  • Using hard-cut style for user-facing text, which can look unpolished if it cuts off mid-word.

Best practices

  • Use word-boundary truncation for any user-facing text (like previews or excerpts) for a cleaner look, and reserve hard-cut for strict byte/character-limited fields.

Tips

  • For SEO meta descriptions specifically, pair this tool with the Meta Description Length Checker to confirm your truncated text fits the recommended display length.

Frequently asked questions

Yes, with no signup and no limit on how much text you truncate.
Word boundary cuts at the last complete word before the limit, avoiding a cut mid-word; hard cut cuts at the exact character limit regardless of whether it lands in the middle of a word.
Yes — the tool reserves room for the suffix within your specified max length, so the final truncated text (including the suffix) never exceeds the limit you set.
It's returned unchanged, with no suffix added, since no truncation is needed.

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