Fix Garbled Text and Accented Characters
Repair names, email lists and CSV files where accented letters turned into gibberish, like chloé instead of chloé or “ instead of a quote mark.
Why text gets garbled
Accented letters like é are stored as two bytes in modern UTF-8 files. When a program opens the file as an older Western format (Windows-1252, often Excel on Windows), each byte is shown as its own character, so é becomes é, ü becomes ü and curly quotes become “.
This tool reverses exactly that mistake, word by word, and only changes words that decode cleanly, so correct text, emoji and other languages are left alone. To stop it happening again, save CSVs as "CSV UTF-8" in Excel.
How to use the Fix Garbled Text
- Paste the damaged text, or open the .txt or .csv file.
- Press Fix text.
- Check the list of changes underneath to see exactly what was corrected.
- Copy the fixed text or download it as a new file.
Where garbled text comes from
Opening a UTF-8 CSV in Excel by double-clicking, then saving it again.
Exporting contacts from one system and importing them into another that expects a different encoding.
Copying text between old and new software, or between Windows and Mac programs.
Emails and web pages that declare the wrong character set.
Fixing a CSV for your email platform
Open the damaged CSV in this tool, fix it and download the result. The downloaded file is saved as UTF-8 with the marker Excel needs, so names display correctly when opened again.
Then import it into your email platform or CRM as usual.
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What the garbled text fixer does
This tool repairs text where accented letters and quote marks have turned into strange symbols, such as José instead of José or ’ instead of an apostrophe. That usually happens when a contact list or CSV is opened or saved in the wrong format. Paste the text or open the file, and you get back readable names and words you can use again.
Benefits
- Fixes the common mix-upsIt reverses the most frequent cause of garbled text, so letters like é, ü and ñ, curly quotes and dashes come back the way they were meant to look.
- Handles double damageIf a file was opened and saved wrongly more than once, the tool can undo several layers of the same mistake on a word.
- Leaves good text aloneOnly words that show the garbled pattern and decode cleanly are changed. Correct accents, emoji and other alphabets stay as they are.
- See every changeA list under the result shows each garbled word crossed out next to its fixed version, so you can check the work before using it.
- Works on whole filesOpen a .txt or .csv file and the full contents are fixed in one pass, including names, email addresses and every column.
- Download that opens cleanlyThe fixed text downloads as a UTF-8 file with the marker Excel looks for, so accents display properly when you open it again.
- Honest when it can't helpIf nothing looks garbled, the tool says so and explains that letters already replaced by question marks cannot be recovered.
Who it is for
- A small-business owner whose customer list came out of Excel with broken names like François.
- A marketer about to import contacts into an email platform who doesn't want to greet people with garbled names.
- An office manager moving contacts between an old system and a new CRM.
- Someone who copied text from an email or web page and found quote marks replaced with odd symbols.
- A freelancer cleaning up a client's exported spreadsheet before a mail merge.
How to use it
- Paste the garbled text, or press Open file to load a .txt or .csv file.
- Press Fix text.
- Look over the list of changes below the result.
- Copy the fixed text or download it.
Your privacy
The repair happens entirely in your browser. Your text and files are not uploaded or saved anywhere.
Frequently asked questions
Why do accented letters turn into é and similar?
The file was saved as UTF-8 but opened as an older Western format (Windows-1252), often by Excel. Each accented letter's two bytes are then shown as two separate characters.
Will it damage text that's already correct?
No. It only changes words that contain the typical garbled pattern and that decode cleanly. Correct accents, emoji and other alphabets are left alone.
How do I stop it happening again?
In Excel, save CSV files as "CSV UTF-8 (Comma delimited)". When importing a CSV, choose UTF-8 (65001) as the file origin.
Can it fix question marks or empty boxes?
No. When letters were replaced by ? or a box, the original letters were thrown away and can't be recovered.
Does it work on whole files?
Yes. Open a .txt or .csv file and the whole thing is fixed at once; only damaged words change.
Why do some characters still look wrong?
If letters were replaced by a question mark or a box, the original information was lost when the file was saved, and no tool can recover it.