Staaarter Tools

XML Comment Replacer

Replaces every occurrence of a substring inside <!-- --> comment text across an XML document, leaving elements, attributes, and other content untouched, useful for bulk-updating notes like an author name or a ticket reference. A free online tool from Staaarter, right in your browser.

Runs locallyUpdated 2026-07-23
editing

Overview

Introduction

A stale reference in a comment, an old ticket number, an outdated author name, is easy to miss across a large file.

This tool bulk-updates comment text specifically.

What Is XML Comment Replacer?

A scoped find-and-replace tool that walks the parsed document.

It replaces every occurrence of a substring inside comment nodes only.

How XML Comment Replacer Works

The document is parsed into a tree, and every comment node's text has the search substring replaced via split/join.

The result is then re-serialized with the shared pretty-printer.

When To Use XML Comment Replacer

Use it to bulk-update a stale reference, name, or ticket number left in comments across a large file.

Review with Extract All XML Comments first if you want to see what's there before replacing.

Often used alongside XML Comment Extractor, XML Comment Remover and XML Value Replacer.

Features

Advantages

  • Scoped strictly to comments, won't touch data or markup.
  • Replaces every occurrence in one pass.
  • Runs entirely client-side.

Limitations

  • Matching is literal and case-sensitive, not a regular expression.
  • There's no undo beyond re-pasting your original input, keep a copy before replacing if you're not sure.

Examples

Updating a comment reference

Input

<config><!-- see TICKET-100 --><retries>3</retries></config>

Output

<config>
  <!-- see TICKET-200 -->
  <retries>3</retries>
</config>

The comment text is updated; the surrounding element and its content are untouched.

Best Practices & Notes

Best Practices

  • Use Extract All XML Comments first to review what's there before bulk-replacing.
  • Pick a search term specific enough to avoid touching unrelated comments that share a substring.
  • Re-check the output afterward if several comments could plausibly contain the same reference.

Developer Notes

Replacement reuses the same split/join approach as XML Value Replacer, scoped to comment nodes instead of text nodes.

XML Comment Replacer Use Cases

  • Bulk-updating a stale reference or name across every comment in a file
  • Correcting a recurring typo in comment text left by a previous author
  • Updating an outdated ticket reference across a whole config file's comments

Common Mistakes

  • Expecting this to also update element text, it's scoped strictly to comments; use XML Value Replacer for content.
  • Assuming the change applies everywhere in the file, only comment nodes are affected.

Tips

  • Review with Extract All XML Comments first if you're unsure what's currently in the comments.
  • Check the FAQ above if the output doesn't look like what you expected.

References

Frequently Asked Questions