Converters
XML to String Converter
Validate your XML, then escape it into a single string literal — ready to embed in JSON fields or source code.
In short
Convert XML to an escaped string online: validate the document, then escape quotes and newlines into one string literal safe to embed in JSON or code.
By NaveenKumar T · Updated
- Instant in-browser conversion
- Validates input first
- Validates the XML before escaping
Runs entirely in your browser — nothing you paste or open here is uploaded, logged, or stored.How we handle data →
Example
XML to String: input and output
An application settings file with a comment, an attribute-only element, an & entity inside a URL and double quotes inside text — all of which must survive unchanged.
<settings env="prod">
<!-- rotated weekly -->
<endpoint>https://api.example.com/v2?region=eu&tier=gold</endpoint>
<retry attempts="3" backoff="2s"/>
<banner>Say "hello" & welcome</banner>
</settings>"<settings env=\"prod\">\n <!-- rotated weekly -->\n <endpoint>https://api.example.com/v2?region=eu&tier=gold</endpoint>\n <retry attempts=\"3\" backoff=\"2s\"/>\n <banner>Say \"hello\" & welcome</banner>\n</settings>"The comment, the & entities and the two-space indentation survive verbatim — only the line breaks turned into \n and the double quotes around prod, 3, 2s and hello into \" — so parsing the string back yields the exact original document.
Learn more
How XML to String conversion works
Your XML is first validated — malformed markup is rejected with the exact line and column rather than silently escaped. The verified document text is then JSON-encoded as one string: quotes become \", line breaks become \n, backslashes are doubled.
The output is a valid JSON string value containing your XML verbatim, so the document survives any number of JSON parse/serialize cycles and comes back out character-for-character identical.
When to convert XML to String
APIs frequently carry XML inside JSON: a webhook that forwards a SOAP payload, a configuration field holding an XML template, test fixtures storing raw responses. Pasting raw XML into a JSON file breaks at the first quote — this conversion makes it embeddable, and your code recovers the original by simply reading the string.
Help
Frequently asked questions
Everything you need to know about the XML to String.
01Can I paste XML that already contains a CDATA section?
CDATA sections come through unchanged, the same as comments and the XML declaration: the converter only validates the document and then JSON-encodes the literal text, so <![CDATA[…]]> markers, their contents, and everything around them survive exactly as written inside the escaped string.
02Is this the same as XML entity encoding (< >)?
Entity encoding and this tool solve different problems: entity encoding escapes XML for inclusion in other XML/HTML, while this tool escapes XML for inclusion in a STRING (JSON or code literal) — quotes and control characters are backslash-escaped, angle brackets stay as-is. Use whichever matches the destination format.
03Does the converter reformat or minify the XML before escaping it?
After validation the text is taken verbatim — comments, the <?xml …?> declaration, attribute order, entities such as & and your original indentation are all preserved; only leading and trailing whitespace is trimmed. Each line break becomes a \n escape, each tab a \t, and every double quote around an attribute value becomes \". Angle brackets need no escaping inside a string. If you want a compact single-line string, minify the XML first with the XML Minify tool, then convert.
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