Binary to text converter
Convert binary (and decimal codepoints) to text and back. Handles 7-bit and 8-bit groupings, arbitrary separators, and reversed bit order.
Open in ctfpalA wall of ones and zeroes is the most visually obvious encoding there is, which makes it a favourite for beginner challenges and for the output of steganography tools. The only real decision is the grouping.
Seven bits or eight?
ASCII needs only seven bits, so some challenges emit groups of seven and some pad to eight. If the total bit count divides by 8, try that first; if it only divides by 7, the author was being economical. Getting this wrong produces text that is almost right - readable letters interleaved with garbage - which is a reliable sign you picked the wrong width rather than the wrong encoding.
- Bit count divides by 8 and the first bit of each group is 0: standard 8-bit ASCII.
- Bit count divides by 7 only: 7-bit ASCII.
- Decodes to text but every character is shifted or scrambled: try reversing the bit order within each byte, a common output from LSB steganography tools that walk pixels in the other direction.
Worked example
8-bit ASCII
Input
01110000 01101001 01100011 01101111 01000011 01010100 01000110Result
picoCTFEvery group starts with 0 - the signature of 7-bit ASCII padded into bytes.
Load this example in the workspacePart of a module
1. Recognising encodings
Tell Base64 from hex from Base32 from binary on sight, peel layered encodings, and learn why an encoding is not encryption.
Practise on real challenges
Go deeper
- Spot the encoding: reading base64, base32, hex and friends at a glanceAlphabet, length, and padding are enough to name almost any encoding on sight. A field guide to the encodings CTFs actually use, the magic prefixes that tell you what is underneath, and the traps that make a correct guess look wrong.
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