$re = '/([a-zA-Z0-9]{1,3}_)?[a-zA-Z0-9]{8}-[a-zA-Z0-9]{4}-[a-zA-Z0-9]{4}-[a-zA-Z0-9]{4}-[a-zA-Z0-9]{12}/m';
$str = '7_b4718152-d9ed-4724-b3fe-e8dc9f12458a7_b4718152-d9ed-4724-b3fe-e8dc9f12458a
7_b4718152-d9ed-4724-b3fe-e8dc9f12458a
b4718152-d9ed-4724-b3fe-e8dc9f12458a
_b4718152-d9ed-4724-b3fe-e8dc9f12458a';
preg_match_all($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