angular.filters.nl2br.js

/*

# Usage in html template:

"xxx | nl2br"

<div ng-bind-html=" YourString | nl2br "></div>

or:

"xxx | nl2br:Boolean"

Boolean( true or flase or just keep null) means is xhtml  or not

if is xhtml, replace with <br/> ; if not , replace with <br>

<div ng-bind-html=" YourString | nl2br:true "></div>


-------------------------

# Example:

//==Analog data===
$scope.items = [
    {"message": "test"},
    {"message": "New\nLine"},
]
//=====
<div class="comment" ng-repeat="item in items">
    <p ng-bind-html=" item.message | nl2br "></p>
    <!-- or with linky -->
    <p ng-bind-html=" item.message | linky | nl2br "></p>
</div>

-------------------------

# Output result:

<div class="comment ng-scope" ng-repeat="item in items">
    <p class="ng-binding" ng-bind-html=" item.message | nl2br ">
        test
    </p>
</div>
<div class="comment ng-scope" ng-repeat="item in items">
    <p class="ng-binding" ng-bind-html=" item.message | nl2br ">
        New<br>Line
    </p>
</div>

*/


angular.module('myModule')
.filter('nl2br', ['$sanitize', function($sanitize) {
	var tag = (/xhtml/i).test(document.doctype) ? '<br />' : '<br>';
	return function(msg) {
		// ngSanitize's linky filter changes \r and \n to &#10; and &#13; respectively
		msg = (msg + '').replace(/(\r\n|\n\r|\r|\n|&#10;&#13;|&#13;&#10;|&#10;|&#13;)/g, tag + '$1');
		return $sanitize(msg);
	};
}]);

You forget about boolean is_xhtml variable in your comments ;)
What wrong with using <br /> everywhere?

I was wondering the same thing as @vpArth...
So I looked up on W3schools:

Differences Between HTML and XHTML

In HTML, the <br> tag has no end tag.
In XHTML, the <br> tag must be properly closed, like this: <br />.

But HTML will handle the self-closing tag <br /> as well, so for compatibility issues, just don't bother trying to find out in which doctype we are, just use <br /> ;-)

Source (Stack Overflow): HTML 5: Is it <br>, <br/>, or <br />?

TL;DR

Always use <br />.
See my fork here (Bonus: CoffeeScript version)