Incompatible character encodings for some markdown links

pmusaraj · September 25, 2026, 2:24am

Thanks for the report, this should fix it

github.com/discourse/discourse

FIX: Encode Unicode avatar URLs in Markdown endpoints (#44106)

main ← fix-incompatible-character-encodings-markdown-links

merged 11:15AM - 25 Sep 26 UTC

pmusaraj

+16 -1

Previously, Markdown topic endpoints could raise an encoding error for authors w…ith Unicode usernames, as reported [on Meta](https://meta.discourse.org/t/413290). This change percent-encodes non-ASCII characters in avatar URLs so these topics render correctly, with regression coverage for the reported username.

Topic		Replies	Views
URLs with encoding are altered when using Discourse link function Support	7	158	April 15, 2026
Unicode usernames Development rest-api	28	1935	November 29, 2024
Topic with Japanese in URL doesn't redirect if URL doesn't perfectly match Bug	71	5221	October 21, 2019
Automatic encoding of parsed URL params Development	43	8694	May 15, 2025
Links broken with (at least) two underscores in URL Bug	9	2244	June 15, 2022

Incompatible character encodings for some markdown links

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