Text to JSON
Paste INI/conf, key=value (.env / .properties), logfmt, CSV/TSV, or /etc/passwd-style text and get clean, structured JSON. The format is auto-detected (switch the Report output to see which was chosen), types are inferred, and everything runs locally in your browser — nothing is uploaded.
About this tool
Paste a block of loosely-structured plain text and get clean JSON back. One box handles five shapes and auto-detects which one you pasted:
- INI / .conf —
[section]headers become nested objects, flat keys stay at the top level. - key=value / .env / .properties — one pair per line into a flat object;
exportprefixes,key: value, and quoted values are all tolerated. - logfmt — space-separated
level=info msg="server started" port=8080pairs become one JSON object per line, with quoted values and bare-key boolean flags. - CSV / TSV — a header row plus data rows become an array of objects; the
delimiter (
,;tab|) is auto-sniffed and RFC-4180"a, b"quoting is honored. - /etc/passwd-style — colon-delimited lines map to named fields
(
name,password,uid,gid,gecos,home,shell, or a 4-field group).
Lines starting with # or ; are treated as comments and skipped. Everything
runs locally in your browser — nothing is uploaded.
Options
- Input format — leave on Auto-detect and it picks the shape for you, or pin one (handy when a colon file isn't really passwd, or a single-column CSV needs forcing).
- Detect booleans & numbers — on by default: unquoted
true/falsebecome booleans, integers and decimals become numbers, and an empty value becomesnull. Turn it off to keep every value a lossless string (e.g. to preserve leading zeros like007). Quoted values always stay strings either way. - Pretty-print — on by default for 2-space indented JSON; turn it off to minify to one line.
- Output as — JSON (the parsed value), NDJSON (one compact record per
line, JSON-Lines), or Report (wraps the data in
{ detected_format, record_count, data }so you can see what auto-detect chose).
Worked examples
logfmt log lines → array of objects
level=info msg="server started" port=8080
level=error msg="connection refused" code=502
becomes
[
{ "level": "info", "msg": "server started", "port": 8080 },
{ "level": "error", "msg": "connection refused", "code": 502 }
]
INI config → nested JSON
app = demo
[server]
host = localhost
port = 8080
becomes { "app": "demo", "server": { "host": "localhost", "port": 8080 } }.
CSV → array of objects (with type inference)
name,age,admin / Alice,30,true becomes
[{ "name": "Alice", "age": 30, "admin": true }] — the header row supplies the
keys, and 30/true are inferred as a number and a boolean.
Limits & edge cases
- Auto-detect is a heuristic. Ambiguous text (say, one colon-delimited line) can be mis-tagged — switch Output as to Report to see what was chosen, and pin Input format to override it.
- CSV needs a header + at least one data row. A single line errors; pin a different format if the data really is one row.
- Duplicate keys keep the last value. JSON objects can't repeat a key, so a repeated INI/key=value key is overwritten by the later one.
- Type inference is whole-document, not per-field. Quote a value (or turn Detect booleans & numbers off) to force a specific value to stay a string.
- Everything is parsed in memory in your browser tab, so very large pastes can be slow.
FAQ
How does auto-detect decide which format I pasted?
It scans the non-comment lines in order: a [section] header means INI; a line
packing two or more space-separated key=value pairs means logfmt; consistent
colon-delimited lines with no = mean passwd; lines that mostly carry one = or
: per line mean key=value; and a delimiter that splits rows into a consistent
2-plus columns means CSV. If nothing matches it falls back to key=value. Set
Output as to Report to see the detected_format it landed on, and pin
Input format if the guess is wrong.
Why did my numbers or booleans come out as strings (or vice versa)?
By default Detect booleans & numbers is on, so unquoted true/false become
booleans and numeric values become numbers. Two things keep a value a string: it
was quoted in the source (port = "8080" stays "8080"), or you turned the
option off to preserve values exactly — useful for zip codes or IDs with
leading zeros like 007. An empty value becomes null when detection is on.
What's the difference between JSON, NDJSON, and Report output?
JSON is the parsed value itself — a nested object for INI and key=value, an
array of objects for logfmt, CSV, and passwd. NDJSON (JSON-Lines) emits one
compact record per line, which is what many log and data pipelines ingest.
Report wraps the result as { detected_format, record_count, data } so you
can confirm which format auto-detect chose and how many records it found.
Is my data uploaded anywhere?
No. The conversion runs entirely in your browser via WebAssembly — the text you paste never leaves your machine, so it's safe for config files, credentials, or log lines you'd rather not send to a server.
Can it handle CSV with commas inside quoted fields, or tab/semicolon files?
Yes. The delimiter is auto-sniffed from comma, semicolon, tab, and pipe, and
RFC-4180 double-quoting is honored — "a, b" stays a single field and ""
inside a quoted field becomes a literal ". Blank column headers fall back to
field1, field2, and so on. Pin Input format to CSV / TSV if a table
with only one column would otherwise be read as key=value.
Developer & Automation Access
Run it from the terminal
Same engine as this page, headless — via the gizza CLI:
gizza tool text-to-json 'level=info msg="server started" port=8080
level=error msg="connection refused" code=502'New to the CLI? Get gizza →
Open it by URL
Pre-fill and auto-run this tool with query parameters — the names match the API/CLI:
https://gizza.ai/tools/text-to-json/?text=level%3Dinfo%20msg%3D%22server%20started%22%20port%3D8080%0Alevel%3Derror%20msg%3D%22connection%20refused%22%20code%3D502&format=auto&detect_types=true&pretty=true&output=jsonMachine-readable descriptor: tool.json — title + parameters JSON Schema for agents.