When you need to unescape
Logs, message queues and error trackers often store a JSON payload as a string inside another JSON document, so every quote arrives as \" and every line break as \n. Unescaping decodes those sequences using the same rules as a JSON parser, and if the result is itself valid JSON, it is pretty-printed.
Payloads that were escaped twice (\\\" in the raw text) are common when a string is serialised at two layers. "Unescape again" repeats the step until you reach the real data.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need to include the outer quotes?
No. Paste the text with or without surrounding double quotes; both work.
What are \u sequences?
\u followed by four hex digits is a UTF-16 code unit, for example \u00e9 is é. Characters outside the Basic Multilingual Plane, like most emoji, are written as two of them (a surrogate pair) and are combined back into one character.
Why do I get "Invalid escape"?
JSON only allows \" \\ \/ \b \f \n \r \t and \uXXXX. Sequences like \x41 or \' come from JavaScript or Python string syntax and are not valid JSON escapes.
Is the text sent anywhere?
No, unescaping runs entirely in your browser.