convert string to byte[]

Question

How do you convert string to byte[] in C#?

Keep in mind that the array of bytes you get is entirely dependent upon the string encoding which is being used -- the textual representation of a string is lost if you do not how how it is encoded. — void-pointer, Apr 14 '11 at 00:17

Mark Cidade · Answer 1 · 2011-04-14T00:18:51.930

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Note that .NET strings are encoded as Unicode (UTF-16):

byte[] bytes = Encoding.Unicode.GetBytes("a string");

edited Apr 14 '11 at 00:18

answered Apr 14 '11 at 00:13

Mark Cidade

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score 6 · Answer 2 · answered Apr 14 '11 at 00:14

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using byte[] data = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(myString);

answered Apr 14 '11 at 00:14

Teoman Soygul

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Yep but I've actually never came close to using any UTF16 specific characters to date and UTF8.GetBytes always did the job (especially when performance is critical) – Teoman Soygul Apr 14 '11 at 00:20
I know but I was assuming that the OP wanted the actual bytes that the string contains. – Mark Cidade Apr 14 '11 at 00:26

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 16 '18 at 23:59

You can use LINQ:

var input     = "myValue";
var byteInput = input.ToCharArray ().Select ( character => ( byte ) character ).ToArray ();

Assert.AreEqual ( input, new string ( byteInput.Select ( character => ( char ) character ).ToArray () ) );

And add the encoding before or after if encoding is something you want to do.

convert string to byte[]

3 Answers3