$re = '/<a\s.*href=[\'"]([^\'"]+)[\'"].*>.*</a>/';
$str = '<a href="http://stepic.org/">Sample</a>
<a target="blank_" href="https://stepic.org">Sample</a>
<a href=\'http://stepic.org\'>Sample</a>
';
preg_match_all($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