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There are different versions of base85, it is in general perfect for dense passwords https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ascii85

Also allows & so probably not safe to use in HTML (assuming browsers may helpfully add the omitted ; ).

Why are ` ~ _ | ; excluded? I could maybe see backtick and pipe to be shell friendly.

But it includes $, which is decidedly shell-unfriendly.

Probably because 85 symbols are enough to store 32 bits in 5 characters. You’d need 256 symbols to do better.