What do %20, %C3%A9 and similar codes in a link mean?

You copied the address of a page, pasted it into a message, and the part your browser showed as "Annual Report.pdf" came out as "Annual%20Report.pdf". Or the café name in the link turned into "caf%C3%A9". Or someone sent you a link, you clicked it, and the page could not be found. Seeing percent signs where letters used to be makes it look as if the link has been damaged.

Let us put your mind at rest first: most of those percent codes are packaging, not damage. Web addresses may only contain a limited set of characters, and neither spaces nor letters like é and ñ appear on that list. So the browser rewrites them as short codes that begin with a percent sign. In other words, %C3%A9 is simply the rule-abiding way to put "é" inside an address. Below you will learn to read these codes and to tell them apart from a link that really is broken.

What is behind the percent sign?

The rule fits in one sentence: any character that cannot appear in an address as it is gets written as a percent sign followed by a two-character code. Those two characters come from the digits 0-9 and the letters A-F, and together they stand for a number. In this notation, the number for a space is 20, which is why every space in an address becomes %20.

Accented letters take one step more. Computers today store text in a scheme called UTF-8, where plain English letters use one number each and letters like é, ñ or ü use two. Each number gets its own percent code, so a single "é" shows up in the address as two pieces, %C3 and %A9. The diagram below follows three examples through that journey.

The codes you are most likely to meet

In English-language links, the usual suspects are spaces in file names, accented letters in people's and place names, and a handful of punctuation marks. A quick reading tip: a code starting with %C3 that is immediately followed by a second percent code is almost always one accented letter.

One surprise catches many people out. Word processors and phones replace the straight apostrophe with a curly one, and a title such as "Mother’s Day" pasted into a link turns into "Mother%E2%80%99s". The curly apostrophe is three numbers long, so it takes three percent codes. If a link built from a document looks oddly long, this is often why.

Why is a space sometimes %20 and sometimes +?

Each can stand for a space, just not everywhere. %20 works in every part of an address. A + means a space only after the question mark, where search boxes and forms put what you typed. In a link like "…/search?q=weather+in+london", the search was for "weather in london".

Before the question mark, a + is a real plus sign. So do not try to repair a space in a file name by typing + yourself; the file will not be found. And for a genuine plus sign to survive in a search value, it is written as %2B.

Why do links break when you share them?

The percent codes themselves do not break a link; what usually breaks it is the route it travels. Here are the four most common cases and what to do about each.

• A space that was never encoded: if you typed the link by hand or copied it from a document, a plain space may have slipped in. Messaging apps treat the link as finished at the first space, and the rest is no longer clickable. Fix: copy the link from the browser's address bar, which hands it over with the space already turned into %20.
• A line break in the middle: when a long link wraps onto two lines in an email, the second line can get lost. Fix: put the link on a line of its own, with nothing before or after it.
• Punctuation stuck to the end: a full stop, comma or closing bracket right after the link can be taken as part of it by some apps. Fix: leave a space between the link and the punctuation, or avoid ending a sentence with the link.
• Double encoding: when an already encoded link gets encoded again, the percent sign itself becomes %25 and %20 turns into %2520. Such a link will not open. Fix: decode it once with the tool below; if codes like %20 are still there, decode it again.

Making an encoded link readable

To see what a link actually says, paste it into the URL Encode and Decode tool and set Direction to "Decode". Each line is handled separately, so you can paste several links one under another. The link stays inside the tool and is not sent anywhere, which matters for addresses that carry login information.

The Encoding scope option matters here as well. With "Full address" selected, the tool only opens up letters and spaces and leaves the codes that hold the address together untouched, such as %2F (slash), %26 (ampersand) and %3D (equals sign), so the result is still a working link. With "Component" selected it opens those up too; that is best for reading everything, but the output may no longer be a working link.

One gap to know about: when decoding, this tool does not turn + into a space; it leaves it as it is. If you are reading a search link where spaces were written as +, read each + as a space.

Accented letters in the domain name: addresses starting with xn--

Everything so far applies to the part of the address after the first slash. The domain name itself, the part that ends in .com or .co.uk, is converted by a different method. A name such as "café.com" becomes "xn--caf-dma.com" behind the scenes, and no percent signs are used.

If you see a name starting with xn-- in a link, that is not damage either; it is the machine spelling of a domain with special letters. One warning, though: scammers sometimes register names with letters that look almost identical to a well-known brand. Never type your login details into an xn-- address you do not recognise. The URL tool does not touch the domain part; that conversion is the browser's job.

Frequently asked questions

What does %20 mean?

%20 is a space. Spaces are not allowed in addresses, so the browser writes them with this short code. When you see "new%20folder", read "new folder".

Is it a problem to send a link in its percent-coded form?

No, it is actually safer. The coded form contains only permitted characters, so mail and messaging apps do not split it. When the recipient opens it, their browser shows the letters in readable form again.

Why do I see %2520 in a link?

The link has been encoded twice. The first round turns a space into %20; the second turns the percent sign in that code into %25, giving %2520. Decoding the link once fixes it.

How should I name a file I am going to share as a link?

Leaving spaces and accented letters out of the name is the smoothest option: "annual-report.pdf" instead of "Annual Report.pdf". The Slug Generator does this for you: type the name without its extension, and the tool turns accented letters into their plain versions and spaces into hyphens; then add the extension back.

Can I delete the long part after the question mark?

Often that part carries advertising and tracking details, and the page usually still opens without it. On some sites, though, the search term or the product option you chose lives there too. Open the shortened link once to test it before you send it.

Last updated: October 12, 2026