What is the difference between CRLF, LF, and CR?

LF is a single line feed (U+000A) used by Unix, Linux, and modern macOS. CRLF is a carriage return followed by a line feed (U+000D U+000A) used by Windows and many network protocols. CR alone (U+000D) was used by classic Mac OS through version 9.

Why do mixed line endings cause problems?

A file with both CRLF and LF confuses version control, shows phantom changes in diffs, and can break shell scripts where a stray carriage return becomes part of a variable. Normalising to one style throughout fixes these silent bugs.

How does conversion work safely?

The tool first reduces every CRLF and lone CR to a single LF, giving a clean baseline. It then expands that LF to the target ending, so converting never doubles up carriage returns or leaves orphaned characters regardless of the input mix.

Which ending should I use?

Use LF for source code, web files, and anything in Git or Unix tooling, which is the modern default. Use CRLF only when a Windows-specific tool, Notepad, or certain protocols require it. CR alone is obsolete and almost never needed today.

Line Ending Converter (CRLF / LF)

Text files end their lines differently across platforms: Unix and macOS use a single LF, Windows uses CRLF, and classic Mac used a bare CR. This tool detects which you have, warns about mixed files, and rewrites everything to one consistent style.

How it works

Conversion goes through a normalised intermediate so no input mix can corrupt the result:

1. Normalise:  replace every \r\n and every lone \r with \n
   (now the text uses only LF, whatever it started with)
2. Expand to the target:
   LF   → \n
   CRLF → \r\n
   CR   → \r

Detection counts CRLF first, then remaining lone CR and lone LF, so a \r\n is never double-counted. If more than one style appears, the tool flags the file as mixed.

Example and tips

A shell script saved on Windows with CRLF often fails on Linux with errors like bad interpreter because the carriage return clings to the shebang line — converting to LF fixes it instantly. For source code and anything tracked in Git, standardise on LF; reserve CRLF for the rare Windows tool that truly demands it.