# Japanese characters in tags are gibberish

**URL:** <https://community.mp3tag.de/t/japanese-characters-in-tags-are-gibberish/42384>\
**Category:** Support\
**Created:** [July 19, 2018, 1:45am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/japanese-characters-in-tags-are-gibberish/42384 "2018-07-19T01:45:32Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![cheetahsweater](https://community.mp3tag.de/user_avatar/community.mp3tag.de/cheetahsweater/32/5477_2.png) [@cheetahsweater](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/cheetahsweater)\
**Post date:** [July 19, 2018, 1:45am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/japanese-characters-in-tags-are-gibberish/42384/1 "2018-07-19T01:45:32Z")

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I'm attempting to convert a text file's tags into album info, as seen here:

 ![image](https://community.mp3tag.de/uploads/default/original/2X/d/da00b4c5a3ec841db27a4395070d0bcae6a92a18.png)

But when the files are tagged, this is what it shows:

 ![image](https://community.mp3tag.de/uploads/default/original/2X/6/6d859170fa30f8acd32244e5f460f46ca1203c17.png)

And this is how the tags display in Windows, too.

How do I make the tags Japanese? These are my mpeg encoding settings, so let me know if they're ok, and if not, then what to do. If they are, though, what do I do?

 ![image](https://community.mp3tag.de/uploads/default/original/2X/1/10a77aede74d939ca5c0312798d5e361db58a7b6.png)

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**Author:** ![ohrenkino](https://community.mp3tag.de/user_avatar/community.mp3tag.de/ohrenkino/32/4843_2.png) [@ohrenkino](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/ohrenkino)\
**Post date:** [July 19, 2018, 6:59am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/japanese-characters-in-tags-are-gibberish/42384/2 "2018-07-19T06:59:13Z")

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The settings in MP3tag look ok to me.  
Perhaps the text file needs to be saved in UTF format as well (it may be in ISO).  
To be sure, you may add a column in the files list that shows the id3 character encoding  
(%\_id3v2\_character\_encoding%)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![cheetahsweater](https://community.mp3tag.de/user_avatar/community.mp3tag.de/cheetahsweater/32/5477_2.png) [@cheetahsweater](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/cheetahsweater)\
**Post date:** [July 19, 2018, 5:16pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/japanese-characters-in-tags-are-gibberish/42384/3 "2018-07-19T17:16:11Z")

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You were right! Once I changed the text file's encoding from UTF-8 to Unicode, it worked! Thank you!!!

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**Author:** ![system](https://community.mp3tag.de/uploads/default/original/2X/c/ce7035d426cb755a7916793326d23b465222a407.png) [@system](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/system)\
**Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 12:27pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/japanese-characters-in-tags-are-gibberish/42384/4 "2026-02-09T12:27:33Z")

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