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Letter Frequency Counter
See how often each letter appears, ranked and charted.
| Letter | Count | Share | Distribution | English |
|---|
Quick Tool Overview
The Letter Frequency Counter ranks every letter in a text by how often it appears, with counts, percentages and a bar for each. Standard English frequencies are shown alongside, which is the starting point for breaking any substitution cipher.
- What it does
- Ranks letters by frequency with percentages and a chart
- You give it
- Plain text or an encrypted message
- You get back
- A ranked frequency table compared against English norms
- Best for
- Cryptograms, puzzles, Scrabble study and text analysis
About the Letter Frequency Counter
Letter frequency is the oldest tool in codebreaking and still the most useful. In ordinary English, E is about 12 per cent of all letters, T about 9, and A, O, I and N follow close behind. A substitution cipher keeps those proportions intact even though the letters change, which is exactly what makes it breakable.
This counter ranks every letter in your text by frequency, shows each as a percentage, and draws a bar so the shape of the distribution is visible at a glance. Standard English frequencies are shown alongside for comparison, so a cryptogram's most common symbol lines up against the letter it most likely stands for. It is equally useful for Scrabble study, keyboard layout arguments and simply seeing what your own writing over-uses.
Key features of the Letter Frequency Counter
Ranked with a visual bar
The shape of the distribution is visible at a glance rather than having to be read out of a column of numbers.
English baseline included
Each letter shows its expected English frequency beside the observed one, which is what makes a cipher solvable.
Percentages, not just counts
Frequencies are shown as a share of all letters, so texts of different lengths can be compared directly.
Case folded by default
E and e are the same letter for frequency purposes, which is what cryptanalysis assumes.
Non-letters reported separately
Spaces, digits and punctuation are counted but kept out of the ranking, since they are not part of a letter distribution.
How to use the Letter Frequency Counter
-
1
Paste the text or cipher
Plain English, an encrypted message or any block of letters.
-
2
Read the ranking
Letters are ordered from most to least frequent, with counts and percentages.
-
3
Compare with English
The expected English frequency sits beside each letter, which is the starting point for solving a substitution cipher.
-
4
Copy the table
The whole frequency table can be copied out for a spreadsheet or a write-up.
Frequently asked questions
In order: E, T, A, O, I, N, S, H, R. Those nine make up roughly seventy per cent of all letters in ordinary English text, which is why frequency analysis works so well on short messages.
It does the analysis, not the solving. Matching the most frequent cipher letter to E and the next to T is usually enough to crack the first few words, after which the rest falls out from context.
No. Only letters are ranked, since that is what frequency analysis works on. The counts of spaces, digits and punctuation are shown separately below the table.
About 200 letters gives a usable distribution and 1,000 gives a good one. Below roughly 100 letters, chance dominates and the ranking will not match the expected English order.
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