---
url: /flow/guide/scripting-reference/functions/file/loadfiletostring.md
---

# LoadFileToString

## Declaration

`Function LoadFileToString( const aFileName : string) : string`

`Function LoadFileToWideString( const aFileName : string) : widestring`

### Example

```pascal
procedure OnMapEvent(var Value:Variant);
var data : string;
begin
  data := LoadFileToString('c:\test.txt'); // reads file into string
LogInfo('First five characters from file: ' + Copy(data, 1, 5));
end;
```

## Description

Loads the contents of file aFileName into a string. Also see [SaveToFile](/flow/guide/scripting-reference/functions/file/savetofile).

Use the WideString version to handle Unicode characters.