Token Counter Visualizer
Count tokens for various LLM models (GPT, Claude) and visualize how the model tokenizes your text.
What is the Token Counter Visualizer?
The Token Counter Visualizer is a free tool that counts how many tokens a piece of text uses and shows the exact chunks the tokenizer produces. Type or paste text and it displays the token count, character count, and a color-coded breakdown of every token.
It uses the GPT tokenizer, the same byte-pair encoding behind GPT-4 and GPT-4o, so the count reflects how an OpenAI model would split your input. Each token chunk is rendered as a colored span, and hovering one reveals its numeric token ID.
The tool also estimates API cost based on standard GPT-4o pricing for the current token count. Everything runs in your browser with no signup, and your text is not sent to any server.
How to use the Token Counter Visualizer
- 1Type or paste your text into the Text content box.
- 2Read the Token Count card, which updates live with the token total and the raw character count.
- 3Check the Token Cost Estimate card for approximate GPT-4o input and output costs at the current count.
- 4Scroll to the Token Visualization section to see the text split into individual colored token chunks.
- 5Hover over any chunk to see its numeric token ID in the tooltip.
What you can use it for
- Checking whether a prompt fits inside a model's context window before sending an API request.
- Estimating the cost of a prompt or completion using GPT-4o pricing.
- Understanding why a short string costs more tokens than expected, for example with unusual punctuation or non-English text.
- Trimming a long prompt down to a target token budget while editing.
- Learning how byte-pair encoding splits words, whitespace, and symbols into tokens.
- Comparing how rewording a prompt changes its token count.
Key features
- Live token counting powered by the GPT byte-pair tokenizer.
- Color-coded visualization of every individual token chunk.
- Per-token IDs shown on hover for inspecting tokenizer output.
- GPT-4o input and output cost estimates based on standard pricing.
Frequently asked questions
What is a token counter?
A token counter measures how many tokens a piece of text uses when processed by a language model. Models do not read characters or words directly; they read tokens, so the token count determines context usage and API cost.
How does the token counter visualizer count tokens?
It uses the GPT tokenizer, the byte-pair encoding used by GPT-4 and GPT-4o, to encode your text. The number of resulting tokens is the count, and each token is displayed as a separate colored chunk so you can see exactly where the splits fall.
Why is my token count higher than my word count?
Tokenizers split text into sub-word pieces, and whitespace, punctuation, rare words, and non-English characters often become multiple tokens. As a rough guide, English text averages around four characters per token, so token counts usually exceed word counts.
Is the token count accurate for GPT-4 and GPT-4o?
Yes. The tool uses the GPT byte-pair tokenizer, which is the same encoding GPT-4 and GPT-4o use, so the count matches what those models see for your input text.
How is the GPT-4o cost estimate calculated?
The tool multiplies the current token count by standard GPT-4o per-million-token rates for input and output. It is an estimate for the displayed token count; your actual bill depends on combined prompt and completion tokens and any current pricing.
Is my text sent to a server when counting tokens?
No. Tokenization runs entirely in your browser using a JavaScript tokenizer library. The text you paste stays on your machine and is never uploaded.