Mojibuster

Fix special characters in CSV files

Your CSV shows é, ü or ’ instead of the right characters? Drop the file into the box – Mojibuster repairs it and saves it as UTF-8.

Works with text and these files:

  • CSV
  • TXT
  • JSON
  • XML
  • SRT
  • VTT
  • TSV
  • MD
  • HTML
  • SQL
  • LOG

For example Excel exports, database dumps, subtitles or website code.

Repair

  1. Drop a file or paste text
  2. It gets repaired automatically
  3. Copy or download
or simply drag a file here

  • No upload. Your files are repaired right in your browser and never leave your device.

  • Servers in the EU. Mojibuster runs on a server in Finland (EU), so the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) applies. Read the GDPR (EUR-Lex)

Why do characters break in CSV files?

A CSV file doesn’t say which character encoding it uses – every program has to guess. If one system exports the file as UTF-8 and another reads it as Windows-1252, accented letters turn into sequences like é. The other way round, a Windows-1252 file often shows up as � in a UTF-8 program.

Repair a CSV file in three steps

  1. Drag your CSV file into the box above or click Choose file.
  2. Mojibuster detects the encoding, repairs broken characters and shows every change under What changed?.
  3. Click Download. The file is saved as UTF-8 – with a BOM if you like, so Excel opens it correctly.

Delimiters, quotes and line breaks stay exactly as they were. Only broken characters are changed.

How to avoid the problem next time

  • Excel: Use “File → Save As” and pick CSV UTF-8 (Comma delimited).
  • LibreOffice Calc: When saving as CSV, tick “Edit filter settings” and choose the character set Unicode (UTF-8).
  • Google Sheets: CSV exports are always UTF-8 – problems only appear when another program opens them.
  • Databases and shops: Set the export to UTF-8; for MySQL and MariaDB use utf8mb4.

Frequently asked questions

Are delimiters and quotes preserved?

Yes. Mojibuster only replaces broken character sequences. Semicolons, commas, quotes and line breaks stay unchanged.

Should I save the CSV with or without a BOM?

If you want to open the file in Excel: with a BOM, that’s how Excel recognizes UTF-8. For imports into databases, shops or scripts, no BOM is usually the better choice.

My CSV is saved in ANSI – does that work too?

Yes. Mojibuster detects Windows-1252 (ANSI) files automatically and converts them to UTF-8. The result then says “Read as Windows-1252 (ANSI)”.

How large can the CSV file be?

Up to 100 MB. Large files are processed in the background while a progress bar shows how far it got.

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