SMS segment calculator.
See exactly how your text message will be encoded and how many segments it uses, and which characters are making it longer than it needs to be.
Placeholders like [First name] count as typed. Check segments with real names and dates filled in.
Type or paste a message to begin.
Characters forcing Unicode:
| Encoding | Single SMS | Each segment of a long SMS |
|---|---|---|
| GSM-7 | 160 | 153 |
| Unicode (UCS-2) | 70 | 67 |
A single SMS can carry 160 characters in the GSM-7 character set, or 70 characters when the message needs Unicode (UCS-2), for example because of an emoji. Longer messages are split into segments of 153 (GSM-7) or 67 (UCS-2) characters, because part of each segment holds the information that stitches them back together on the phone.
If any character in the message isn’t in the GSM-7 set, the whole message is encoded as UCS-2, which cuts the per-segment limit from 160 to 70 characters. Curly quotes and some dashes copied from word processors do the same thing.
GSM-7 has an extension table for characters like €, [, ], {, }, ~, ^, | and \. Each of these uses an escape code plus the character, so it counts as two.
Many providers and carriers bill business texting per segment, so a message that splits into three segments can cost about three times as much. Check your provider’s pricing.
No. The calculation runs entirely in your browser.
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