Comments & Entities

Two small tools that solve two unrelated problems: leaving yourself notes the browser won't show, and displaying characters HTML would otherwise try to interpret as markup.

Comments

Anything between <!-- and --> is ignored by the browser. It's useful for explaining a non-obvious choice, or for temporarily switching off a chunk of markup while you're testing something:

</> a comment
<!-- TODO: replace this placeholder image before launch -->
<img src="placeholder.jpg" alt="Coming soon">

Comments can also span multiple lines. Try commenting out the second paragraph below and watch it disappear from the result:

Try it yourself
Result

Entities

Characters like < and > are part of HTML's own syntax, so you can't just type them into a page and expect them to show up literally — the browser reads them as the start of a tag. An entity is a stand-in code that displays the character instead of acting on it.

  • &lt; displays <
  • &gt; displays >
  • &amp; displays &
  • &quot; displays "
  • &nbsp; displays a space that won't collapse or line-break like a normal one
  • &copy; displays ©
Try it yourself
Result
Note: you'll almost never need entities for regular text — only for the handful of characters HTML treats specially (<, >, &) or ones that are awkward to type directly, like a copyright symbol.
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