Turn curly “smart” quotes and apostrophes into plain straight quotes — or convert straight quotes into typographic ones.
Smart Quote Converter
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How it works
There are two families of quotation marks. Straight quotes ( " and ' ) are the ASCII characters on your keyboard, essential for writing code, CSV files, JSON, and anything a machine will parse. Curly or “smart” quotes ( “ ” ‘ ’ ) are the directional, typographic versions that word processors insert automatically for elegant prose.
Problems start when the two mix. Paste smart quotes into a code editor and your program throws a syntax error; paste straight quotes into a designed document and the typography looks amateur. This converter goes both ways. Curly → Straight flattens every directional quote and prime to its plain ASCII equivalent. Straight → Curly reads the surrounding context to decide whether each mark opens or closes, turning apostrophes and quotation marks into the correct ‘, ’, “, or ”.
Pick a direction and the result updates live. Everything is computed in your browser, so nothing is uploaded and even large documents convert instantly.
Examples
Code copied from a blog: const x = “hi” → Curly → Straight → const x = "hi" that actually compiles.
Plain draft: She said "it's fine" → Straight → Curly → She said “it’s fine” with correct typography.
An apostrophe at the start of a word, like 'twas, is curled to ’twas rather than an opening quote.
Smart quotes vs straight quotes
Type
Double
Single / apostrophe
Used by
Works in code?
Straight
" "
' '
Keyboards, programming, JSON, CSV
Yes
Curly / smart
“ ”
‘ ’
Word, Google Docs, AI tools, print
No — causes errors
Curly quotes look better in finished prose, but they're a frequent source of bugs when text moves from a word processor or an AI chat into code, a database, or a spreadsheet. If a JSON file or script suddenly won't parse after pasting, mismatched smart quotes are a common culprit — convert them to straight quotes and it usually works.
Frequently asked questions
How does it know which curly quote to use?
When converting to curly, the tool treats a quote as opening if it follows the start of the text, whitespace, or an opening bracket, and closing otherwise. That heuristic handles the vast majority of everyday sentences correctly.
Why do straight quotes break my code?
Programming languages only recognise the ASCII characters " and '. Directional curly quotes are different code points, so the parser sees an unexpected symbol and errors out. Flattening them fixes the build.
Does it also handle primes?
Yes. Prime and double-prime marks used for feet, inches, and minutes are converted to straight quotes in the curly-to-straight direction, since they are frequently mistaken for quotation marks.
Will it curl a contraction correctly?
Contractions such as don't and it's use a closing single quote as the apostrophe, and the tool produces ’ in those positions automatically.
Is the conversion done privately?
Yes. It runs entirely in your browser with no network requests.
What are smart quotes?
Smart (or 'curly') quotes are the typographic quotation marks “like these” and apostrophes ’ that word processors and AI tools insert automatically. Straight quotes (" and ') are the plain versions produced by a keyboard and required by most programming languages and data formats.
Why do smart quotes break code and CSV files?
Programming languages, JSON, and CSV expect straight quotes (" and '). A curly quote is a different Unicode character, so pasting AI or Word text with smart quotes into code causes syntax errors, and into a CSV can corrupt fields. Converting to straight quotes fixes it.
Can I convert straight quotes back to curly?
Yes. Switch the direction and the tool intelligently turns straight quotes into opening/closing curly quotes and apostrophes — handy for polished prose and typography.
Does it change any other characters?
No. It only converts the quote and apostrophe characters. Everything else in your text is left untouched.