My hash doesn't match the expected value

check encoding. This tool uses UTF-8. If the other system used UTF-16 or Latin-1, the hashes will differ even for the same text. Also check for trailing newlines — `hello` and `hello\n` produce different hashes.

I hashed a file but the hash doesn't match the published checksum

you might be hashing the filename or file path instead of the file contents. On the command line, use `shasum -a 256 file.bin` or `sha256sum file.bin`.

Can I use SHA-256 for password hashing?

don't. SHA-256 is too fast. A GPU rig can compute billions of SHA-256 hashes per second. Use bcrypt, scrypt, or Argon2 instead — they're intentionally slow and memory-hard, which is exactly what you want for passwords.

Two different inputs gave me the same hash

no they didn't. Double-check for invisible characters, encoding differences, or copy-paste errors. No SHA-256 collision has ever been found.

also SHA-2 family, 512-bit output, uses 64-bit operations so it's actually faster than SHA-256 on 64-bit CPUs. Both are secure. SHA-256 is more widely used and sufficient for everything.

All Tools

toolzy.dev / Crypto & Hashing / SHA-256-Generator

T

SHA-256 Hash Generator

Generate SHA-256 hash from any text input.

Input Text

SHA-256 Hash