Truncate a string with an ellipsis
Shorten text to a maximum length without cutting in the middle of a word or a Unicode character.
- JavaScript
- GreenSnippets
- MIT
- Executed with Node.js 22
function truncate(text, max, ellipsis = "…") {
const chars = [...text];
if (chars.length <= max) return text;
const room = Math.max(0, max - [...ellipsis].length);
let cut = chars.slice(0, room).join("");
const lastSpace = cut.lastIndexOf(" ");
const endsOnBoundary = chars[room] === " ";
if (!endsOnBoundary && lastSpace > room * 0.6) cut = cut.slice(0, lastSpace);
return cut.trimEnd() + ellipsis;
}Example / expected output
truncate("The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog", 20) // "The quick brown fox…"How it works
Spreading the string ([...text]) iterates code points, so emoji are not split in half. The function backs up to the last space when the cut would split a word and a space exists late enough in the allowed range, then appends the ellipsis; the result never exceeds max characters.
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