$re = '/(?:90|(?:[0-8]{0,1}[0-9]))[°\s](?:[0-5]{0,1}[0-9])[\'\s](?:[0-5]{0,1}[0-9](?:[.,]\d{1,5})?)["\s]{0,1}[NS]\s?,?\s?(?:180|(?:1[0-7]{1}[0-9]{1})|(?:0?[0-9]{1}[0-9]{1})|(?:[0-9]{1}))[°\s](?:[0-5]{0,1}[0-9])[\'\s](?:[0-5]{0,1}[0-9](?:[.,]\d{1,5})?)["\s]{0,1}[EW]/';
$str = '40 31 21N, 105 05 39.00W';
preg_match_all($re, $str, $matches, PREG_SET_ORDER, 0);
// Print the entire match result
var_dump($matches);
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php