html-to-text

What is html-to-text?

The html-to-text npm package is designed to convert HTML documents into plain text. It can handle various HTML elements, preserving the basic structure and formatting in a text-only format. This is particularly useful for extracting text from HTML emails, web pages, or any HTML content for use in text-based formats.

What are html-to-text's main functionalities?

Convert HTML to plain text

This feature allows you to convert a string of HTML into a plain text format, with options such as word wrapping.

const htmlToText = require('html-to-text');
const html = '<h1>Hello World</h1>';
const text = htmlToText.fromString(html, {
  wordwrap: 130
});
console.log(text); // Outputs: 'Hello World'

Handling of tables

This feature enables the conversion of HTML tables into a tabular text format, preserving the layout of the data.

const htmlToText = require('html-to-text');
const html = '<table><tr><td>Foo</td><td>Bar</td></tr></table>';
const text = htmlToText.fromString(html, {
  tables: true
});
console.log(text); // Outputs a text representation of the table

Handling of lists

This feature converts HTML lists into plain text, with customizable prefixes for list items.

const htmlToText = require('html-to-text');
const html = '<ul><li>Item 1</li><li>Item 2</li></ul>';
const text = htmlToText.fromString(html, {
  unorderedListItemPrefix: '- '
});
console.log(text); // Outputs: '- Item 1\n- Item 2'

Handling of hyperlinks

This feature allows for the conversion of hyperlinks into plain text, with options to hide or display the URL based on the link text.

const htmlToText = require('html-to-text');
const html = '<a href='https://example.com'>Example</a>';
const text = htmlToText.fromString(html, {
  hideLinkHrefIfSameAsText: true
});
console.log(text); // Outputs: 'Example'

Other packages similar to html-to-text

turndown

Turndown is an HTML to Markdown converter that allows users to convert HTML content to Markdown format. It is different from html-to-text as it focuses on Markdown output rather than plain text.

html2plaintext

html2plaintext is another package that converts HTML to plain text. It aims to produce human-readable text similar to what a browser would render, but it may have different parsing and formatting options compared to html-to-text.

html-to-text-cli

html-to-text-cli is a command-line interface for converting HTML to plain text. While it uses the html-to-text package under the hood, it is specifically designed for CLI usage and may offer a different user experience.

README

html-to-text

An advanced converter that parses HTML and returns beautiful text. It was mainly designed to transform HTML E-Mail templates to a text representation. So it is currently optimized for table layouts.

Features:

• Transform headlines to uppercase text.
• Convert tables to an appropiate text representation with rows and columns.
• Word wrapping for paragraphs (default 80 chars).
• Automatic extraction of href information from links.
• <br> conversion to \n.
• Unicode support.
• Runs in browser and server environments.

Installation

npm install html-to-text

Or when you want to use it as command line interface it is recommended to install it globally via

npm install html-to-text -g

Usage

const htmlToText = require('html-to-text');

const text = htmlToText.fromString('<h1>Hello World</h1>', {
  wordwrap: 130
});
console.log(text); // Hello World

Options:

You can configure the behaviour of html-to-text with the following options:

• tables allows to select certain tables by the class or id attribute from the HTML document. This is necessary because the majority of HTML E-Mails uses a table based layout. Prefix your table selectors with an . for the class and with a # for the id attribute. All other tables are ignored. You can assign true to this attribute to select all tables. Default: []
• wordwrap defines after how many chars a line break should follow in p elements. Set to null or false to disable word-wrapping. Default: 80
• linkHrefBaseUrl allows you to specify the server host for href attributes, where the links start at the root (/). For example, linkHrefBaseUrl = 'http://asdf.com' and <a href='/dir/subdir'>...</a> the link in the text will be http://asdf.com/dir/subdir. Keep in mind that linkHrefBaseUrl shouldn't end with a /.
• hideLinkHrefIfSameAsText by default links are translated the following <a href='link'>text</a> => becomes => text [link]. If this option is set to true and link and text are the same, [link] will be hidden and only text visible.
• noLinkBrackets dont print brackets around the link if true.
• ignoreHref ignore all document links if true.
• ignoreImage ignore all document images if true.
• preserveNewlines by default, any newlines \n in a block of text will be removed. If true, these newlines will not be removed.
• decodeOptions defines the text decoding options given to he.decode. For more informations see the he module.
• uppercaseHeadings by default, headings (<h1>, <h2>, etc) are uppercased. Set to false to leave headings as they are.
• singleNewLineParagraphs by default, paragraphs are converted with two newlines (\n\n). Set to true to convert to a single newline.
• baseElement defines the tags whose text content will be captured from the html. All content will be captured below the baseElement tags and added to the resulting text output. This option allows the user to specify an array of elements as base elements using a single tag with css class and id parameters e.g. [p.class1.class2#id1#id2, p.class1.class2#id1#id2] . Default: body
• returnDomByDefault convert the entire document if we don't find the tag we're looking for if true.
• longWordSplit describes how to wrap long words, has the following parameters:
  • wrapCharacters is an array containing the characters that may be wrapped on, these are used in order
  • forceWrapOnLimit defines whether to break long words on the limit if true.
• format pass an object to enable custom formatting for specific elements (see below)
• unorderedListItemPrefix defines the string that is used as item prefix for unordered lists <ol>. Default: ' * '

Override formatting for specific elements

By using the format option, you can specify formatting for these elements: text, image, lineBreak, paragraph, anchor, heading, table, orderedList, unorderedList, listItem, horizontalLine.

Each key must be a function which eventually receive elem (the current elem), fn (the next formatting function) and options (the options passed to html-to-text).

var htmlToText = require('html-to-text');

var text = htmlToText.fromString('<h1>Hello World</h1>', {
  format: {
    heading: function (elem, fn, options) {
      var h = fn(elem.children, options);
      return '====\n' + h.toUpperCase() + '\n====';
    }
  }
});

console.log(text);

Command Line Interface

It is possible to use html-to-text as command line interface. This allows an easy validation of your generated text and the integration in other systems that does not run on node.js.

html-to-text uses stdin and stdout for data in and output. So you can use html-to-text the following way:

cat example/test.html | html-to-text > test.txt

There also all options available as described above. You can use them like this:

cat example/test.html | html-to-text --tables=#invoice,.address --wordwrap=100 > test.txt

The tables option has to be declared as comma separated list without whitespaces.

Example

<html>
  <head>
    <meta charset="utf-8">
  </head>

  <body>
    <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0">
      <tr>
        <td>
          <h2>Paragraphs</h2>
          <p class="normal-space">At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua. At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet. <a href="www.github.com">Github</a>
          </p>
          <p class="normal-space">At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua. At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.
          </p>
        </td>
        <td></td>
      </tr>
      <tr>
        <td>
          <hr/>
          <h2>Pretty printed table</h2>
          <table id="invoice">
            <thead>
              <tr>
                <th>Article</th>
                <th>Price</th>
                <th>Taxes</th>
                <th>Amount</th>
                <th>Total</th>
              </tr>
            </thead>
            <tbody>
              <tr>
                <td>
                  <p>
                    Product 1<br />
                    <span style="font-size:0.8em">Contains: 1x Product 1</span>
                  </p>
                </td>
                <td align="right" valign="top">6,99&euro;</td>
                <td align="right" valign="top">7%</td>
                <td align="right" valign="top">1</td>
                <td align="right" valign="top">6,99€</td>
              </tr>
              <tr>
                <td>Shipment costs</td>
                <td align="right">3,25€</td>
                <td align="right">7%</td>
                <td align="right">1</td>
                <td align="right">3,25€</td>
              </tr>
            </tbody>
            <tfoot>
              <tr>
                <td>&nbsp;</td>
                <td>&nbsp;</td>
                <td colspan="3">to pay: 10,24€</td>
              </tr>
              <tr>
                <td></td>
                <td></td>
                <td colspan="3">Taxes 7%: 0,72€</td>
              </tr>
            </tfoot>
          </table>

        </td>
        <td></td>
      </tr>
      <tr>
        <td>
          <hr/>
          <h2>Lists</h2>
          <ul>
            <li>At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.</li>
            <li>At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.</li>
          </ul>
          <ol>
            <li>At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.</li>
            <li>At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.</li>
          </ol>
        </td>
      </tr>
      <tr>
        <td>
          <hr />
          <h2>Column Layout with tables</h2>
          <table class="address">
            <tr>
              <th align="left">Invoice Address</th>
              <th align="left">Shipment Address</th>
            </tr>
            <tr>
              <td align="left">
                <p>
                Mr.<br/>
                John Doe<br/>
                Featherstone Street 49<br/>
                28199 Bremen<br/>
                </p>
              </td>
              <td align="left">
                <p>
                Mr.<br/>
                John Doe<br/>
                Featherstone Street 49<br/>
                28199 Bremen<br/>
                </p>
              </td>
            </tr>
          </table>
        </td>
        <td></td>
      </tr>
      <tr>
        <td>
          <hr/>
          <h2>Mailto formating</h2>
          <p class="normal-space small">
            Some Company<br />
            Some Street 42<br />
            Somewhere<br />
            E-Mail: <a href="mailto:[e-mail]">Click here</a>
          </p>
        </td>
      </tr>
    </table>
  </body>
</html>

Gets converted to:

PARAGRAPHS
At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd
gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet. Lorem ipsum
dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor
invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua. At vero eos
et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea
takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet. Github [www.github.com]

At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd
gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet. Lorem ipsum
dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor
invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua. At vero eos
et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd gubergren, no sea
takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

PRETTY PRINTED TABLE
ARTICLE                  PRICE   TAXES             AMOUNT   TOTAL   
Product 1                6,99€   7%                1        6,99€   
Contains: 1x Product 1                                              
Shipment costs           3,25€   7%                1        3,25€   
                                 to pay: 10,24€                     
                                 Taxes 7%: 0,72€                    

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

LISTS
 * At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd
   gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.
 * At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd
   gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.

 1. At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd
    gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.
 2. At vero eos et accusam et justo duo dolores et ea rebum. Stet clita kasd
    gubergren, no sea takimata sanctus est Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

COLUMN LAYOUT WITH TABLES
INVOICE ADDRESS          SHIPMENT ADDRESS         
Mr.                      Mr.                      
John Doe                 John Doe                 
Featherstone Street 49   Featherstone Street 49   
28199 Bremen             28199 Bremen             

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

MAILTO FORMATING
Some Company
Some Street 42
Somewhere
E-Mail: Click here [[e-mail]]

License

(The MIT License)

Copyright (c) 2019 werk85 <[e-mail]>

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the 'Software'), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED 'AS IS', WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.