$re = '/(<img .*?imgur\.com(.*?))(?=\/?\s?>)/m';
$str = 'I have been searching <img src="https://i.imgur.com/NknpNdu.jpg" alt=""> for... I have been searching <img src="https://i.imgur.com/NknpNdu.jpg" alt=""> for... I have been searching <img src="https://i.imgur.com/NknpNdu.jpg" alt=""> for... I have been searching <img src="https://i.imgur.com/NknpNdu.jpg" alt="" /> for... ';
$subst = "$1 class=\"newClass\"";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$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 PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php