Free double space to JSON array converter

Double space to JSON array

What the double space to JSON array converter does

Paste column-aligned text and this double space to JSON array converter splits it wherever two or more spaces sit together, trims what is left, and gives you back a JSON array you can paste into code.

The rule is not literally two spaces. It is a run of two or more, so a column padded out with seven spaces splits in exactly the same place as one padded with two. That is what makes it work on output that was aligned by eye rather than by a delimiter.

Single spaces are left alone. "Los Angeles" stays one entry. A converter that splits on any whitespace would turn it into two, which is the usual reason people end up looking for this page rather than the plain space converter.

Everything runs in your browser. Nothing is uploaded, there is no run limit, no length cap and no account.

A worked example

What column-aligned text looks like going in and coming out

Take three padded columns: the word apples, a gap, the words Los Angeles, a gap, the number 40. The gaps are whatever width the original alignment used.

Out comes a JSON array of three strings: apples, Los Angeles and 40. Note the third one. It is a string with quotes around it, not a number, because every piece is treated as text. The output is pretty-printed with a two-space indent, one entry per line, so it reads cleanly in a diff.

How it works

How to convert double-spaced text to a JSON array in three steps

Two clicks and a paste. There is nothing to configure.

Step 1

Paste your column-aligned or double-spaced text into the box.

Step 2

Press Convert to JSON. The split happens in your browser, instantly.

Step 3

Copy the array out. Check the entry count matches the number of columns you expected.

The exact rules

The rules this converter follows, precisely

Five behaviours worth knowing before you trust the output.

Two or more spaces split

A single space never splits. Any run of two or more does, whatever its length.

Each piece is trimmed

Leading and trailing whitespace around a segment is removed before it becomes an entry.

Empty pieces disappear

Anything that trims to nothing is dropped, so you cannot produce a deliberate empty string in the array.

Everything is a string

Numbers, true and false all come out quoted. There is no type detection here.

Escaping is handled

Quotes, backslashes and line breaks inside an entry are escaped properly, so the result is valid JSON you can parse.

The catch

Line breaks are not a delimiter on this page

This converter splits on spaces only. A newline in your input is not treated as a separator, so if you paste a five-line table, the line breaks stay inside whichever entry they fall in and come out escaped as a backslash-n in the JSON.

That is usually not what you want from a multi-line table. If your rows matter, convert one row at a time, or join the rows first. If your items are actually one per line, the line breaks option lives on a different tool and will give you a cleaner result.

Common failures

What breaks when the alignment is not a true double space

Plenty of aligned text is not aligned with spaces at all. Terminal output, spreadsheets and log files very often use tab characters, which look identical on screen and are a completely different codepoint. This converter will not split on a tab, so a tabbed table comes back as one long entry.

The other common cause is a no-break space or a narrow no-break space sitting in the gap. Both render like a normal space and neither matches the split rule. If a conversion returns one entry when you expected six, that gap is almost certainly not made of ordinary spaces.

Picking the right one

When a different delimiter is the right converter

Other sites put every separator on one page. Here each one is its own converter, so pick by what is actually in the gap.

Tabs

Use the tab to JSON array converter. Tabs look like spaces and are not.

A single space

The space converter splits on any whitespace run, including single spaces. It breaks multi-word entries apart.

Commas, semicolons, colons, pipes, slashes

Each has its own converter. They split on that character alone.

Something else entirely

The custom delimiter converter takes whatever string you type as the separator.

In practice

Who uses a double space to JSON array converter, and when

Mostly people turning something that was formatted for a human into something a program can read.

Copying a terminal table

Command output padded into columns, headed for a config file or a test fixture.

Lifting a list out of a PDF

PDF text extraction very often pads with runs of spaces rather than tabs.

Turning a document table into data

A table pasted as plain text usually arrives with the alignment intact as spaces.

Building a quick fixture

Fifteen values you already have on screen, needed as a JSON array in the next thirty seconds.