Regular Expressions 101

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An explanation of your regex will be automatically generated as you type.
Detailed match information will be displayed here automatically.
  • All Tokens
  • Common Tokens
  • General Tokens
  • Anchors
  • Meta Sequences
  • Quantifiers
  • Group Constructs
  • Character Classes
  • Flags/Modifiers
  • Substitution
  • A single character of: a, b or c
    [abc]
  • A character except: a, b or c
    [^abc]
  • A character in the range: a-z
    [a-z]
  • A character not in the range: a-z
    [^a-z]
  • A character in the range: a-z or A-Z
    [a-zA-Z]
  • Any single character
    .
  • Alternate - match either a or b
    a|b
  • Any whitespace character
    \s
  • Any non-whitespace character
    \S
  • Any digit
    \d
  • Any non-digit
    \D
  • Any word character
    \w
  • Any non-word character
    \W
  • Non-capturing group
    (?:...)
  • Capturing group
    (...)
  • Zero or one of a
    a?
  • Zero or more of a
    a*
  • One or more of a
    a+
  • Exactly 3 of a
    a{3}
  • 3 or more of a
    a{3,}
  • Between 3 and 6 of a
    a{3,6}
  • Start of string
    ^
  • End of string
    $
  • A word boundary
    \b
  • Non-word boundary
    \B

Regular Expression
No Match

/
/
gm

Test String

Substitution

Processing...

Code Generator

Language

Generated Code

import java.util.regex.Matcher; import java.util.regex.Pattern; public class Example { public static void main(String[] args) { final String regex = "^((?:(?:[^\"\\n;]*\"[^\"\\n]*\")+(?!\"))?+[^\"\\n;]*+\"?[^\"\\n;]*);.*"; final String string = "Peekaboo ; A comment starts with a semicolon and continues till the EOL\n" + "Unless the semicolon is surrounded by dquotes \"Don’t do it ; here\" ;but match me; once\n" + "Im not surrounded \"so pay attention to me\" ; \"peekaboo\"\n" + "Im not surrounded \"so pay attention\" to;me\" ; \"peekaboo\"\n" + "Im not surrounded \"so pay attention to me ; peekaboo\n" + "Dquote escapes a dquote so \"dont pay attention to \"\"me;here\"\" buster\" do it ; here\n" + "Don’t pay attention to \"\"\"me;here\"\"\" but do \"\"it;here\"\" \n" + "and \"dont do \"\"it;here\"\"\" either ;peekaboo\n" + "but \"pay attention to \"it;here\"\" ;not here though\n" + "Simon said \"I like goats\" then he added \"and sheep;\" ;a good comment is \"here\n" + "Simon said \"I like goats\" then he added \"and sheep;\" dont do it here\n" + "Simon said \"\"I like goats;\"peekaboo\n" + "Simon said \"I like goats;\"\"peekaboo\n\n" + "\"\"I like goats;\"peekaboo\n" + "\"I like goats;\"\"peekaboo\n\n" + "\"aaa ; bb\""; final String subst = "$1"; final Pattern pattern = Pattern.compile(regex, Pattern.MULTILINE); final Matcher matcher = pattern.matcher(string); // The substituted value will be contained in the result variable final String result = matcher.replaceAll(subst); System.out.println("Substitution result: " + result); } }

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 Java, please visit: https://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/util/regex/Pattern.html