XML Formatter
The XML Formatter tool helps you reformat messy XML into a readable, hierarchical structure. Validate syntax, detect errors, and make working with XML more manageable for developers and testers.
The XML Formatter tool helps you reformat messy XML into a readable, hierarchical structure. Validate syntax, detect errors, and make working with XML more manageable for developers and testers.
Welcome to our fast and easy-to-use XML Formatter — a free tool designed to beautify, clean, and validate your XML code. Whether you're working with configuration files, API responses, or data exchange formats, our tool helps make your XML structured and readable.
XML (eXtensible Markup Language) is a markup language used to store and transport data in a format that's both human-readable and machine-readable. It’s commonly used in web services, configuration files, and application data structures.
Your data never leaves your device. All processing is done locally in your browser, ensuring 100% privacy and data safety. No data is uploaded or saved to any server.
Before formatting:
<note><to>Alice</to><from>Bob</from><message>Hello</message></note>
After formatting:
<note> <to>Alice</to> <from>Bob</from> <message>Hello</message> </note>
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XML 1.0 defines a document as well-formed when it has one root element, every start tag has a matching end tag, tags nest properly without overlapping, attribute values are quoted, and names are case-sensitive. This formatter hands your text to the browser's XML parser first, so any violation produces an error message instead of output. Typical causes are an unclosed tag, an unescaped ampersand, two top-level elements, or an entity such as that XML does not predefine. Only five entities are built in: <, >, &, " and '.
Once parsing succeeds, the tool rebuilds the document with your chosen indentation of two or four spaces. Each element starts on its own line, whitespace-only text between tags is dropped, and elements with no content are written in the self-closing form. Comments are kept. The output begins at the root element, so the XML declaration and any DOCTYPE are not carried over. CDATA sections are also not rewritten, so their content may be missing. Text and attribute values are written decoded, so check them if they contained escaped characters.
Yes. All data is processed locally in your browser. We do not send any data to a server.
XML is commonly used for structured data storage, configuration files, and data exchange in APIs.
Yes. When you click Format, the tool checks that the XML is well-formed and shows an error message if something is wrong, such as a missing closing tag.
No. This tool is 100% free and does not require sign-up or login.
No. The output is built from the root element, so the declaration line and any DOCTYPE are left out. Add the declaration back manually if the consuming system requires it.
HTML parsers are forgiving, but XML is strict. Unclosed tags, unquoted attributes, mismatched letter case and undefined entities such as all make the XML parser report an error.