🔢 Binary Converter - Online Binary Encoder & Decoder

Binary code is a system that uses only two digits, 0 and 1, to represent information. In computers, these correspond to electrical states (off/on). Each binary digit (bit) represents a power of 2. When combined, these bits can represent any number, character, or data. For example, the letter 'A' is represented as 01000001 in 8-bit binary, which equals 65 in decimal (the ASCII code for 'A').

To convert text to binary: 1) Each character is converted to its numerical value (ASCII or Unicode), 2) That number is converted to binary representation, 3) The result is typically grouped in 8-bit bytes. Our tool handles this automatically - just paste your text and click "Convert to Binary". You can choose between different encoding formats (UTF-8, ASCII) and customize the output format.

ASCII uses 7-8 bits per character and can represent 128-256 characters (basic English letters, numbers, and symbols). UTF-8 is variable-length (1-4 bytes per character) and can represent over 1 million characters, including all international languages, mathematical symbols, and emojis. UTF-8 is backward compatible with ASCII - the first 128 characters are identical. Use ASCII for simple English text and UTF-8 for international or emoji-containing text.

Yes! Simply paste your binary code into the input field and click "Decode from Binary". The tool automatically recognizes binary format and converts it back to readable text. It supports various binary formats including spaced bytes (01001000 01101001), continuous strings (0100100001101001), and prefixed format (0b01001000 0b01101001). The tool intelligently handles different grouping and delimiter styles.

Computers use binary because digital circuits have two stable states: on (representing 1) and off (representing 0). This binary system is: 1) Easy to implement with transistors and logic gates, 2) Less prone to errors than systems with more states, 3) Simple to perform logical and arithmetic operations, 4) Reliable for data storage and transmission. All modern digital electronics are built on this fundamental two-state system.

A byte consists of 8 bits. This is the standard unit of digital information. With 8 bits, you can represent 256 different values (2⁸ = 256), from 00000000 to 11111111, or 0 to 255 in decimal. This is sufficient to represent all ASCII characters. Larger units include: kilobyte (1024 bytes), megabyte (1024 KB), gigabyte (1024 MB), and terabyte (1024 GB).

Binary conversion has many practical applications: 1) Data transmission and network protocols, 2) File encoding and compression, 3) Understanding computer memory and storage, 4) Digital signal processing, 5) Low-level programming and debugging, 6) Cryptography and data security, 7) Educational purposes to understand computing fundamentals, 8) Steganography (hiding messages), 9) Computer science education and curriculum.

Yes! Our tool supports multiple conversion modes including binary to decimal and binary to hexadecimal. Select the "Decimal ⟷ Binary" or "Hex ⟷ Binary" tab to switch conversion modes. Binary to decimal converts each binary number to its base-10 equivalent. Binary to hexadecimal groups binary digits in sets of 4 (since 16 = 2⁴) for a more compact representation commonly used in programming.