Strikethrough Text Generator — Copy & Paste Unicode
Turn any text into strikethrough characters you can copy and paste anywhere — no special formatting mode needed. Three Unicode styles available, plus Markdown syntax for Slack, Discord and Reddit.
Combining character style
Each character receives a zero-width combining overlay
The combining character is rendered on top of the preceding glyph
Markdown alternative for Slack, Discord, Reddit, GitHub
How does this calculator work?
Type text and get a copy-pasteable strikethrough version using Unicode Combining Long Stroke Overlay (U+0336) inserted after each character. Works in WhatsApp, Telegram, Instagram, Discord and most browsers. For Slack, Discord, Reddit and GitHub, use Markdown's ~~text~~ syntax instead.
Formula
How this is calculated
Most rich-text editors provide a strikethrough button that applies invisible markup — that markup is lost when you paste into a plain-text field. The Unicode combining-character trick works differently: a zero-width combining overlay (U+0336, U+0335, or U+0338) is inserted after every code point in your text. The font renderer draws the overlay visually on top of the preceding glyph, producing a strikethrough appearance that survives a plain-text paste because it is baked into the characters themselves.
U+0336 (Combining Long Stroke Overlay) produces a horizontal line through the middle of each letter and is the most widely compatible choice — it renders correctly in virtually all modern browsers, WhatsApp, Telegram, Instagram, Twitter/X, and Facebook. U+0335 (Combining Short Stroke Overlay) uses a shorter line centred on the letter. U+0338 (Combining Long Solidus Overlay) draws a diagonal slash through each character.
Markdown strikethrough (~~text~~) is a platform-specific alternative: Slack, Discord, Reddit, GitHub, and Obsidian all support it. If you are using one of those platforms, the Markdown syntax may look cleaner, but it does not work in plain-text contexts like WhatsApp, Telegram, or Instagram captions.
Frequently asked questions
Yes — WhatsApp renders Unicode combining characters, so pasting the long-stroke version (U+0336) shows as strikethrough text. WhatsApp also has its own strikethrough using tildes (~text~), but the Unicode version works by paste in any input field without needing to type tildes around the text.
Emoji, accented letters, and complex Unicode scripts (Thai, Arabic, combining diacritics) may already carry combining marks. Adding another overlay can stack oddly depending on the font and rendering engine. The text is still valid Unicode — it just may not look clean on every platform.
Screen readers vary: some announce combining characters, some skip them. For accessibility-critical content — legal documents, form fields, captions for images — use the platform's built-in strikethrough formatting instead of Unicode combining characters.
Also known as
TG we-Calculate Editorial Team. (2026). Strikethrough Text Generator — Copy & Paste Unicode [Online calculator]. TG we-Calculate. https://we-calculate.com/calculator/strikethrough-text-calculator
TG we-Calculate Editorial Team. "Strikethrough Text Generator — Copy & Paste Unicode." TG we-Calculate. 2026. https://we-calculate.com/calculator/strikethrough-text-calculator.
TG we-Calculate Editorial Team, "Strikethrough Text Generator — Copy & Paste Unicode," TG we-Calculate, 2026. [Online]. Available: https://we-calculate.com/calculator/strikethrough-text-calculator
@misc{wecalculate_strikethrough_text_calculator, title = {Strikethrough Text Generator — Copy & Paste Unicode}, author = {{TG we-Calculate Editorial Team}}, howpublished = {\url{https://we-calculate.com/calculator/strikethrough-text-calculator}}, year = {2026}, note = {TG we-Calculate} }
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