Operating System Support for Base64

Learn which operating systems support Base64

Built-in operating system support

All major operating systems have built-in tools to encode and decode Base64. However, these are command-line tools which are not discoverable and may be beyond the expertise of most typical users.

Examples for major operating systems

On Linux, most distributions contain the base64 tool. The common usage arguments are base64 dataToBeEncoded to encode, and base64 -d dataToBeDecoded to decode.

On Windows, the certutil tool provides Base64 encoding capabilities. However, the input data must be in a file. Example usage is certutil -encode inputData.txt outputData.txt.

On MacOS, use the base64 tool. The input data must be in a file. Example usage is base64 -i inputData.txt -o outputData.txt to encode, andbase64 -D -i inputData.txt -o outputData.txt` to decode.

Support via applications

Third-party applications can be used to provide graphical user interfaces (GUIs) for Base64 tools. This allows for easier use and does not require knowledge on how to use a command-line interface.

We've also written about Base64 browser support, if that's what you're looking for.