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ASCII Magic vs ASCIIcraft: Which ASCII Art Tool Should You Use?
By Kailash · Updated June 29, 2026 · 5 min read
The short answer
Both turn images and video into ASCII, in the browser, in real time. Choose ASCIIcraft if you want the deepest pure-ASCII toolkit: 72 character sets, 328 figlet fonts, SVG export and a suite of video utilities. Choose ASCII Magic if you want to turn the same photo or video into many art styles, ASCII plus pixel art, dither, mosaic, halftone, voxel and LEGO, with color and film post-effects, in one editor. In short: ASCIIcraft goes deep on ASCII, ASCII Magic goes wide across styles.
Both tools start from the same question, how do I turn an image or video into ASCII art, and both are genuinely good at it. Where they part ways is philosophy. One specialises in ASCII and goes a long way down that road; the other treats ASCII as one of many art styles you can apply to the same media. This is an honest comparison written by the maker of one of them, so weigh the recommendation accordingly and judge the facts for yourself.
At a glance
| Feature | ASCII Magic | ASCIIcraft |
|---|---|---|
| Image → ASCII | Yes | Yes |
| Video → ASCII | Yes (MP4 / GIF) | Yes (WebM / MP4) |
| Text → ASCII (figlet) | Yes (Text tool) | Yes (328 fonts) |
| ASCII character sets | A focused set of ramps | 72 sets |
| Styles beyond ASCII | 13+ (pixel, dither, mosaic, halftone, voxel, LEGO…) | ASCII only |
| Color output | Yes | Yes |
| Post-effects | Film (bloom, scanlines, CRT, chromatic) | Motion (Ken Burns, zoom, glitch) |
| One-click recipes | Yes | No |
| Image export | PNG, JPG | PNG, WebP, AVIF, SVG |
| Video export | MP4, GIF | WebM, MP4 (audio on Premium) |
| Resolution | Up to 4× source | Up to 250 to 300 char width |
| Processing | Local, in-browser | Local, in-browser |
Where ASCIIcraft wins
ASCIIcraft is a specialist, and it has clearly spent its effort going deep on ASCII rather than wide across styles. If your output is specifically text-character art, it gives you range that a general stylizer doesn't:
- Sheer ASCII depth. 72 character sets, blocks, emoji, binary, braille, Japanese, zodiac, chess and custom glyphs, plus 328 figlet fonts for text-to-ASCII. If you want fine control over exactly which characters build your art, that's more typographic range than ASCII Magic offers.
- SVG and modern image formats. It exports PNG, WebP, AVIF and SVG. The SVG option in particular gives you scalable, print-sharp vector ASCII, which ASCII Magic does not export.
- A video-utility suite. Alongside the converter it bundles an upscaler, trimmer, social crop, GIF maker, background remover and more, useful if you spend a lot of time wrangling video files.
- Audio on video exports. On its Premium tier it can keep the original soundtrack on an ASCII video, handy when the audio is part of the piece.
Where ASCII Magic wins
ASCII Magic is less a dedicated ASCII converter and more an image-and-video art studio, where ASCII is one look among many. The differences that matter:
- Many art styles, not just ASCII. Beyond the core image to ASCII converter, the same editor turns your photo or clip into pixel art, dithering, photo mosaic, halftone, voxel cubes, LEGO, cross, dots and lines, 14 styles in total. ASCIIcraft is ASCII characters only, so anything non-ASCII is out of scope for it.
- One image, every look. Drop a photo once and flip between styles without re-uploading, then layer color grading and film post-effects (bloom, scanlines, CRT curvature, chromatic aberration) on top of whichever style you land on.
- One-click recipes. Curated combinations of style, color and effects, so you get a finished look in a click instead of a settings safari.
- 4× resolution export. A 1080p source exports up to 4320×2440, wallpaper- and poster-ready.
Which should you use?
The honest split is depth versus breadth. If ASCII is the point, you know the look you want is text characters and you care about having every character set, every font and a vector export, ASCIIcraft is purpose-built for exactly that and goes further on pure ASCII than ASCII Magic does. If ASCII is one look you might want among several, or you haven't decided which style suits your photo yet, ASCII Magic lets you try ASCII, pixel art, dither, mosaic, halftone, voxel and LEGO on the same image and export the one that lands.
Match the tool to the output you actually need:
- Want maximum ASCII typography, charsets, figlet fonts, SVG, and a video-tools suite? ASCIIcraft.
- Want one editor that turns a photo or video into many art styles with color and post-effects? ASCII Magic.
- Not sure? Start in ASCII Magic and try a few styles on your own image, if you then decide you want to go deep on pure ASCII specifically, you'll know.
