Custom delimiter to JSON array
What the custom delimiter to JSON array converter does
Type any separator into the delimiter field, a comma, a double colon, a backslash, a string like ' -> ', and paste your delimited text below it. This tool splits on exactly that separator, trims each value, and returns a formatted JSON array. It defaults to a comma if you leave the field blank.
It runs in your browser. Nothing you paste is uploaded, there is no signup, and there is no limit on how much text you convert.
Why this exists
When none of the fixed delimiters fit
Every other converter on this site is fixed to one specific character, comma, tab, pipe, colon and so on, because that matches a real, common export format. Real data does not always cooperate with those fixed choices. Sometimes a system exports something unusual: double colons, a pipe with spaces around it, an arrow made of dashes and a greater-than sign, or a control character represented as visible text.
This tool is the escape hatch for exactly that situation, and for the other common case: your data already contains one of the standard delimiters as part of its actual values, a comma inside an address, a pipe inside a note, so you need a rarer separator that the export tool chose specifically to avoid that collision.
How it works
How to convert text with a custom delimiter to a JSON array in three steps
One extra field compared to the other converters, otherwise identical.
- Step 1
- Type your delimiter into the delimiter field, then paste your delimited text below it.
- Step 2
- Press Convert. The split and trim happen instantly, locally, using exactly the delimiter you typed.
- Step 3
- Copy the resulting JSON array from the output box.
Why it matters
What breaks when the delimiter still appears inside a value
Whatever delimiter you choose, this tool still performs a plain split with no quoting or escaping logic, exactly like every other converter in this family. If the exact string you typed as the delimiter also happens to appear legitimately inside one of your values, it gets split there too, with no way to tell this tool that a particular occurrence should be treated as content rather than a boundary.
The only real fix is choosing a delimiter that genuinely never appears in your data. If your source export used a rare, multi-character sequence specifically to avoid this problem, type that exact sequence rather than a single character, and it will work the same way.
Behind the field
Why the delimiter field accepts more than one character
A single character is not always enough to be safe. Some export formats deliberately use a short, unusual sequence like '::' or '~|~' as their separator, precisely because a two- or three-character sequence is even less likely to occur by accident than any single character alone. This delimiter field accepts any text you type, one character or several, and treats whatever you typed as a literal string to split on, not as a pattern with any special meaning of its own.
That means characters that would normally have special meaning in a search pattern, a period, an asterisk, a question mark, are all treated as plain, literal characters here rather than being interpreted as anything else.
Straight answer
Can I use this to escape a delimiter that appears inside a value?
No, not by itself. This tool has no concept of escaping or quoting, so it cannot tell the difference between a delimiter that is meant to separate two fields and the same character sequence appearing legitimately inside one field's value.
The practical workaround is picking a different delimiter, ideally one that genuinely does not appear anywhere in your actual data, and reprocessing your source with that separator instead if you have control over how the export was generated.
Who uses it
Who uses a custom delimiter to JSON array converter, and when
Developers dealing with a proprietary export format, one built by an internal tool or an older vendor system with its own separator convention, use it to get that data into JSON without writing a bespoke parser. Anyone whose data already contains commas, pipes or tabs as part of the actual values reaches for it once the fixed-delimiter tools have already failed on that data.
It also serves as a general-purpose fallback: when you are not sure which of the other converters applies, typing the exact character you see in your source text here works the same way any of the dedicated tools would.