XML Formatter & Viewer

An XML formatter is a tool that takes raw, minified, or poorly indented XML data and reformats it with proper indentation and line breaks. This makes the XML document human-readable and easier to debug. Our formatter preserves XML declarations, attributes, CDATA sections, comments, and processing instructions while adding consistent indentation throughout the document tree.

XML validation in this tool checks whether the input conforms to the rules of well-formed XML. It uses the browser's built-in DOMParser to parse the XML and detects syntax errors such as unclosed tags, mismatched tag names, invalid characters, and malformed attributes. Note that this checks for well-formedness, not schema validation against an XSD or DTD.

XML (Extensible Markup Language) uses tags and attributes to structure data, while JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) uses key-value pairs. XML supports schemas (XSD), namespaces, CDATA sections, comments, and processing instructions. JSON is lighter-weight and more common in REST APIs. XML remains dominant in enterprise systems, SOAP services, configuration files (like Maven pom.xml, Android manifests), and document formats (XHTML, SVG, RSS).

Yes, completely. This tool processes everything entirely in your browser using JavaScript. No XML data is sent to any server, stored, or logged. Your data never leaves your computer, making it safe for sensitive configuration files, API payloads, or proprietary data structures.

Yes. The formatter fully supports XML namespaces. Namespace prefixes and declarations (xmlns attributes) are preserved exactly as they appear in the original document. Elements with namespace prefixes like <soap:Envelope> or <xsl:template> are formatted correctly with proper indentation.

Beautifying (formatting) XML adds indentation and line breaks to make the document readable, with each element on its own line and child elements indented. Minifying does the opposite: it removes all unnecessary whitespace between tags to produce the smallest possible output, which is useful for reducing file size in production environments or network transfers.

Yes. CDATA sections (<![CDATA[...]]>) are preserved during formatting and minification. The content inside CDATA blocks is kept exactly as-is, since CDATA is used to include text that should not be parsed as XML markup. This is important for embedding HTML, scripts, or other content that contains characters like < and & that would otherwise need escaping.

You can upload .xml and .txt files using the Upload button. The tool reads the file contents directly in your browser and loads them into the input area. There is no file size limit imposed by the tool itself, though very large files (10MB+) may take a moment to process depending on your browser and device.