This tool converts the script Chinese is written in: 這樣寫的字 becomes 这样写的字, or the reverse. It uses OpenCC's mapping tables, which resolve the cases a naive character swap gets wrong — the 发 in 头发 and the 发 in 发财 correspond to two different Traditional characters, and both directions come out right. What it changes is characters, not vocabulary: regional word choice is outside its remit. The dictionary loads when you press the button, after which everything runs in your browser and your text is never transmitted.
How to use it
- Choose a direction with the two buttons at the top: Traditional → Simplified, or Simplified → Traditional. The first is selected by default.
- Paste Chinese text into the Input box on the left. Nothing happens on the right yet — unlike the other text tools on this site, this one does not convert as you type.
- Press Convert at the bottom left. The button is disabled while the input is empty. The first press fetches the dictionary and the output box briefly reads "Converting..."; subsequent presses have no such wait.
- The result appears in the read-only Output box, and Copy at the bottom right takes it away. After editing the input or switching direction you must press Convert again — until you do, the right-hand box still shows the previous result.
- This page has no Clear button. To start on a new draft, select the contents of the input box and delete them.
When it comes in handy
Preparing a first pass of a document for a mainland counterpart
Quotations, specifications and contract annexes consist mostly of proper nouns, figures and sentence structure, so script conversion disposes of nine tenths of the work and leaves a handful of terms. The workflow that holds up: convert here, then have someone who knows the local usage review the nouns — product categories, job titles and legal phrasing are where a reader notices immediately.
Reading Simplified material in the script you are used to
Plenty of open-source documentation, course notes and ebooks exist only in Simplified Chinese. Converting a section to Traditional noticeably speeds up reading, particularly for tutorials you follow along with. Code samples pass through untouched, so you can paste them in along with the prose.
Unifying a collaborative document written in both scripts
On a cross-regional team, one document ends up containing both 伺服器 and 服务器, which makes search and replace miserable because the search term never matches everything. Converting the whole file to one script first makes searching, diffing and review far cleaner.
A first pass over subtitles and product copy
A video published on platforms in both regions usually needs two subtitle files. Converting the existing one saves retyping, but keep the human review step: subtitles appear one line at a time, and a wrong regional term gets pointed out in the comments within minutes.
Limits and behavior
- This is script conversion, not regional localisation.
軟體becomes软体, not the mainland term软件;網路becomes网路rather than网络;程式is written identically in both scripts and passes through unchanged. The reverse direction behaves the same way —软件becomes軟件,视频becomes視頻,数据库becomes數據庫, none of which is what a Taiwanese reader would write. A terminology pass afterwards is unavoidable if the result has to read naturally. - Characters where one Simplified form covers several Traditional ones are handled well, which is the main thing separating this from a crude character swap:
頭髮and發財map correctly to头发and发财,乾淨and幹部both collapse onto干and each comes back correctly, and the usual traps鐘錶,手錶,麵條and餘額are all resolved properly. - A round trip is not guaranteed to reproduce your original. The classic case is
台灣: it converts to台湾, and converting that back yields臺灣, because the table maps to the formal variant. When a document has to exist in both scripts, keep one master and convert from it each time rather than chaining conversions. - Do not use this on Japanese. Japanese kanji are treated as Chinese characters and simplified —
東京都廣島県comes back as东京都广岛県, where the first few characters have been converted while the Japanese-specific県is absent from the table and survives, leaving text that is correct in neither language. - Latin letters, digits, punctuation and line breaks are entirely unaffected, so a mixed-language passage can be pasted whole and only the Han characters are rewritten. Character width is left alone too; use the full/half-width converter if that also needs fixing.
- Only the Taiwan and mainland forms are offered — there is no Hong Kong variant and no option for older or alternate character forms. If your readers are in Hong Kong or Macau, what comes out here is Traditional Chinese following Taiwanese conventions.
- The dictionary is fetched by a dynamic import the first time you press Convert and then kept in memory for reuse. That also means a failed load — an interrupted connection, or a browser extension blocking the file — produces no error message on screen: the code simply puts your original text back into the output box. So if you press Convert and the output is identical to the input, or comes back empty, check your connection and try again.
- Your text is not sent to a server. What gets downloaded is the dictionary; the lookup then happens on your own device, rather than your draft being handed to a remote translation service. That is also why only the first conversion pauses — the wait is for the table, not for a response about your content. Like every page here, this one does load third-party resources such as advertising.
Frequently asked questions
Why does 軟體 become 软体 instead of 软件?
Because the conversion is character by character: 軟 simplifies to 软 and 體 simplifies to 体, giving 软体. 软件 is a different word for the same concept, and producing it would require recognising 軟體 as a lexical unit and substituting a whole different term — vocabulary localisation, which this tool does not attempt. Treat it as the pass that removes ninety per cent of the typing and leaves the terminology decisions to a person.
I edited the text on the left and the right did not change.
Conversion is button-driven rather than live. Press Convert again after every edit; until then the output box holds the previous result. Switching direction does not re-run it either, and because switching leaves both boxes as they were, it is easy to think the new direction was ignored. It was not — press Convert and it updates.
Why is the first conversion slow?
The mapping table is a separate file that is only downloaded when you actually ask for a conversion, so visitors who are just looking around do not pay for data they will never use. During the wait the output box reads "Converting..." and the button is temporarily disabled. Every conversion after that in the same tab is instant, because the table is already in memory.
Why does converting there and back not return my original text?
Simplification is lossy by design: several Traditional characters merged into a single Simplified one, so reversing the process means guessing from context, and the table picks the most common candidate. 台灣 is the example you will hit first — a round trip turns it into 臺灣, which is equally correct and not the same string. For documents that must exist in both scripts, convert from one master each time instead of chaining.
Can I use it on Japanese kanji?
Not advisedly. The tables are built for Chinese, so kanji get simplified to mainland Chinese forms while the shinjitai unique to Japanese, being absent from the tables, are left as they are. The output is a hybrid belonging to neither language. Converting between old and new Japanese character forms needs a different mapping, which is not provided here.
Is my document uploaded to a translation service?
No. What is loaded is a mapping table, and the lookup runs in your browser; no request carries your draft anywhere and no external translation API is called. You can verify it by converting once so the table is cached, then disconnecting from the network and converting again. For completeness: this page loads third-party resources such as advertising, and those connections carry page and ad-slot information, not your content.