How to reformat JSON in Notepad++

Question

I need Notepad++ to take a JSON string from this

{"menu": {"id": "file","value": "File","popup": {"menuitem": [{"value": "New", "onclick": "CreateNewDoc()"},{"value": "Open", "onclick": "OpenDoc()"},{"value": "Close", "onclick": "CloseDoc()"}]}}}

to this...

{"menu": {
  "id": "file",
  "value": "File",
  "popup": {
    "menuitem": [
      {"value": "New", "onclick": "CreateNewDoc()"},
      {"value": "Open", "onclick": "OpenDoc()"},
      {"value": "Close", "onclick": "CloseDoc()"}
    ]
  }
}}

I looked around at all the TextFX options but couldn't find anything that worked.

Mark Rotteveel · Accepted Answer · 2025-02-26 09:32:21Z

1851

Use JSTool

As of Notepad++ v7.6, you can use the Plugin Admin option in Notepad++ to install JSTool.

Manual Install

Download it from https://www.sunjw.us/jstool/npp/#download
Copy JSMinNpp.dll to the plugin directory of Notepad++. You may need to create a directory named "JSMinNPP" in the plugin directory after version 7.6.3

Here's an example of JSON that's been formatted using the tool:

{
  "menu" : {
    "id" : "file",
    "value" : "File",
    "popup" : {
      "menuitem" : [{
      "value" : "New",
          "onclick" : "CreateNewDoc()"
        }, {
          "value" : "Open",
          "onclick" : "OpenDoc()"
        }, {
          "value" : "Close",
          "onclick" : "CloseDoc()"
        }
      ]
    }
  }
}

Tip: Select the code you want to reformat, then Plugins | JSTool | JSFormat.

edited Feb 26 at 9:32

Mark Rotteveel

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answered Feb 22, 2011 at 19:40

Dan

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6 Comments

prograde Over a year ago

JSTool can also format the JSON data. Just press Ctrl-Alt-M. I tried a few plugins now and I find this is the best one.

Dib Over a year ago

This can be installed directly from the built in "Plugin Manager" in Notepad++. Go "Plugins > Plugin Manager > Show Plugin Manager > Available tab"

JG1212 Over a year ago

If JSTOOL and JSONVIEWER are not working, make sure the file is NOT opened from inside a .zip file. For some reason most plugins don't work correctly when the file is opened in windows from within a zip file. Just extract the file first, then open in NP++ and plugins will work fin.

Derek White Over a year ago

Formatting isn't compatible with folding, unfortunately. Quite annoying.

StevenV Feb 3 at 8:21

@Derek White: i have notepad++ v8.7.5 and i can do folding with JStool.

|

TylerH · Accepted Answer · 2024-09-10 21:31:08Z

328

You can use JSON Viewer. For Notepad++ v.7.6+, Plugins Admin... is available to install it:

Open the Menu option "Plugins" -> "Plugins Admin..."
Search for "JSON Viewer"
Check JSON Viewer in List
Click on Install Button
Restart Notepad++
Select JSON text
Go to "Plugins" > "JSON Viewer" > "Format JSON ( Ctrl + Alt + Shift + M )"

edited Sep 10, 2024 at 21:31

TylerH

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answered May 10, 2019 at 7:22

Hardik Leuwa

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3 Comments

nstenz Over a year ago

FYI, I did not have a menu option for Plugins Admin in v7.9.1 32-bit- at least as a non-admin user. I do have it on 7.9.5 64-bit and up, for both admins and not. (Installing plugins does however require admin rights, sadly.)

Victor Zakharov Over a year ago

JSON Viewer cannot parse log structured output from Serilog, for example. JSTool worked without problems.

ArtBindu Over a year ago

awesome ... ...

TylerH · Accepted Answer · 2024-09-10 21:34:43Z

252

Notepad++ requires a plugin to format JSON. You can use the JSON Viewer plugin to do this. To install the plugin, do the following steps:

Open Notepad++ -> press Alt + P -> select Plugins Admin (or Plugin Manager in older versions of Notepad++) -> select JSON Viewer -> click Install
Restart Notepad++
Now you can use this shortcut to format JSON: Ctrl + Alt + Shift + M, or press Alt + P -> select Plugin Manager -> select JSON Viewer -> select Format JSON

edited Sep 10, 2024 at 21:34

TylerH

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answered May 17, 2018 at 11:07

DevMJ

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2 Comments

Stefan Over a year ago

This format algorithm is not robust and fails often, the JSTool (see answer of ibr) is much more robust.

Victor Zakharov Over a year ago

@Stefan I can confirm. JSTool was able to parse log structured output from Serilog (.NET Core 6).

Arvind Chourasiya · Accepted Answer · 2024-09-11 04:11:04Z

48

Add the JSON Viewer Plugin

Open Notepad++, go to Plugins, click "Plugins Admin..."

In the Plugins Admin window, search for JSON Viewer and click on Install

Now after installing the plugin, this is how you can view file in JSON format

edited Sep 11, 2024 at 4:11

answered Sep 4, 2020 at 8:07

Arvind Chourasiya

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Comments

Pang · Accepted Answer · 2018-08-23 07:00:56Z

44

Universal Indent GUI plugin for Notepad++ will turn your sample into:

{
    "menu" : {
        "id" : "file", "value" : "File", "popup" : {
            "menuitem" : [ {
                "value" : "New", "onclick" : "CreateNewDoc()";
            }
            , {
                "value" : "Open", "onclick" : "OpenDoc()";
            }
            , {
                "value" : "Close", "onclick" : "CloseDoc()";
            }
            ];
        }
    }
}

edited Aug 23, 2018 at 7:00

Pang

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answered Nov 20, 2009 at 1:20

JRL

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1 Comment

Anthony Shaw Over a year ago

unfortunately, this does not work with the newest Unicode version of Notepad++ 5.5

Nitin Lawande · Accepted Answer · 2021-03-04 05:50:08Z

12

Steps to add JSON viewer plugin for notepad++:

Download JSON viewer plugin for notepad++ from sourceforge.
Copy NPPJSONViewer.dll into Notepad++\plugins\NPPJSONViewer folder
restart the notepad++
select JSON and click on plugins > JSON Viewer > Format JSON (CTRL+ALT+SHIFT+M).
Done.

answered Mar 4, 2021 at 5:50

Nitin Lawande

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2 Comments

Sagar Over a year ago

Notepad++ says that plugin is not compatible with 64bit version of notepad , do we have any 64bit plugin ?

Ankush Madankar Over a year ago

You could download it from github.com/kapilratnani/JSON-Viewer/releases

ibr · Accepted Answer · 2019-02-11 14:32:47Z

10

simply go to this link download the dll copy and paste the dll to the plugins folder at notepad++, \Notepad++\plugins restart the notepad++, and it should be shown in the list

NOTE: this dll supports 64 bit notepade++

answered Feb 11, 2019 at 14:32

ibr

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Comments

Azzabi Haythem · Accepted Answer · 2023-06-01 12:05:29Z

9

you can use Notepad++ to format Json using Plugin Admin and JSTool but for those who can't install this plugin they can use Postman to Beautify json like this:

edited Jun 1, 2023 at 12:05

answered Jun 1, 2023 at 10:17

Azzabi Haythem

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Comments

Millhouse · Accepted Answer · 2010-08-23 18:18:35Z

7

It's not an NPP solution, but in a pinch, you can use this online JSON Formatter and then just paste the formatted text into NPP and then select Javascript as the language.

answered Aug 23, 2010 at 18:18

Millhouse

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2 Comments

galaktor Over a year ago

@Brent.Longborough Thanks for that little nugget of advice! The JS highlighting has a weird gray background, python highlighting is much easier on the eyes.

C.M. Over a year ago

Online json formatters are good but sometimes you don't want to risk sending the data you're formatting across the Internet.

SUN · Accepted Answer · 2011-01-11 03:35:10Z

7

JSMinNpp plugin will do this job. https://sourceforge.net/projects/jsminnpp/

answered Jan 11, 2011 at 3:35

SUN

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Comments

olliaroa · Accepted Answer · 2019-03-27 11:51:40Z

5

You can view in Notepad++ no problem now (maybe older versions were bugged?)

for win64: You can find the latest plugin here: https://github.com/kapilratnani/JSON-Viewer/releases . The latest zip file contains a .dll file.

And then follow the github priject README instructions:

Paste the file "NPPJSONViewer.dll" to Notepad++ plugin folder

open a document containing a JSON string

Select JSON fragment and navigate to plugins/JSON Viewer/show JSON Viewer or press "Ctrl+Alt+Shift+J"

Voila!! if the JSON is valid, it will be shown in a Treeview

It should be the same process for win32 but I cannot personally verify it.

answered Mar 27, 2019 at 11:51

olliaroa

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Comments

SharpC · Accepted Answer · 2024-04-17 14:31:50Z

5

I didn't have the Plugins Admin option, so the easiest way was to reinstall Notepad++ first (I was using v8.5.8) and select:

Plugins
Plugins Admin

(Also I simply reinstalled Notepad++ over the top of the previous install, I didn't uninstall first.)

In Notepad++ I then went to Plugins → Plugins Admin and searched for the plugins I wanted:

JSON Tools
XML Tools (press Next if when you search "XML" the first one that comes up is "Npp Xml Treeview" instead).

I ticked them both then clicked Install.

edited Apr 17, 2024 at 14:31

answered Jan 29, 2024 at 10:32

SharpC

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1 Comment

Yurelle Over a year ago

FYI, the pretty print function included in the JSON tools package, will delete content if it's not syntaxed properly. Ex: I had one JSON object on each line, without being wrapped in an array, and it formatted the first line's object, and deleted the other 2. Undo-ing and wrapping in the array, fixed it, but just something to keep in mind.

Esko Piirainen · Accepted Answer · 2018-08-27 11:07:51Z

4

If you don't want to install a Notepad++ plugin but you have Firefox and a JSON plugin for Firefox, you can select Run -> Launch in Firefox. You get the contents formatted as JSON using your Firefox plugin.

This is what I personally do.

answered Aug 27, 2018 at 11:07

Esko Piirainen

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Comments

Henke · Accepted Answer · 2021-01-17 15:04:05Z

4

I use 32-bit Notepad++ version 7.5.6. I have found that 32-bit JSToolNpp 1.20.0 does a great job.
The direct link is:
https://sourceforge.net/projects/jsminnpp/files/Uni/JSToolNPP.1.2006.0.uni.32.zip/download
which is redirected from https://sourceforge.net/projects/jsminnpp/.
VirusTotal link:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/008ee0ce889dfd9e96b975cebe6faafe28bc350352e951f3dec97e8e5bec5a07

JSON-Viewer works fine too, but cannot sort the JSON data.

answered Jan 17, 2021 at 15:04

Henke

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Comments

Richard Lloyd · Accepted Answer · 2010-03-10 07:20:04Z

3

It worked for me in the latest edition to Notepad using the UniversalIndentGui.

What I did was under the plugin setting choose Enable Text Auto Update, a window popped up and I selected javascript.

answered Mar 10, 2010 at 7:20

Richard Lloyd

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Comments

DevBezz · Accepted Answer · 2011-03-30 21:43:31Z

3

Notepad 5.8.7 and jsmin 1.7.0.0 works wonderful here.

Be careful though, found out jsmin eats the comments the hard way (should have read first).

answered Mar 30, 2011 at 21:43

DevBezz

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Comments

Stonetip · Accepted Answer · 2012-03-23 03:42:19Z

3

I'm using the JSON Viewer plug-in with NPP 5.9 and it seems to work well.

answered Mar 23, 2012 at 3:42

Stonetip

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Comments

Josh · Accepted Answer · 2014-01-21 03:18:03Z

3

I know this thread is old but I recently ran into a problem with JSToolNPP not being compatible with my newly updated N++, I did find a replacement that seems to work. http://sourceforge.net/projects/nppjsonviewer/

Use at your own risk, ofc. (standard disclaimer from me when linking anything outside the SExchange, fyi)

answered Jan 21, 2014 at 3:18

Josh

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Comments

jslmsca · Accepted Answer · 2020-09-24 17:07:22Z

2

For those of us behind a corporate firewall with no direct access to the internet, using the Plugins Admin won't work. To use the JSMinNpp plugin, you can't just "copy the dll to the plugins folder". It needs to live inside a folder called "JSMinNpp" inside the plugins folder. After doing that and restarting Notepad++, I was able to see the "JSTool" menu option under the Plugins menu.

Tested with Notepad++ 7.8.2 and 7.8.9.

answered Sep 24, 2020 at 17:07

jslmsca

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1 Comment

TylerH Over a year ago

This appears to be a reply to an existing answer rather than an answer itself. Please only post new answers if you have novel solutions to the question. If you have pertinent information about an existing answer, leave a comment under the answer, instead.

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