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

/
/
gmi

Test String

Code Generator

Language

Generated Code

use strict; my $str = 'This is a number also 123-456-7890 This is not a number: 123456 This is not a number, but an address 123 456 My parameters are 90/60/90 - 120/150/120 - not a phone number I am cheeky and I use letter 0 instead of zero 604_213_0293 Or I use | symbol and also 604_2|3_0293 may happen The most classical Canadian number is +1(604)123-4567 hi hi Dashes can be different 123-456–7890 And looks like phone +I(800)-2l4-15O but contain combination with letter \'oi+I(222)3334444oi\', \'io+0 (222) 333 444Ooi\', \'O+l ( 222 ) 3|3 4O40O\', \'+O+l ( 222 ) 3|3 4O40O\', in text 123-567 +(1)-23567 text in text 123567-2 text --------------------------------------- in text 1-800-123-123 1-800-123-123 text in text 1-800-123-123 text --------------------------------------- in text 1-800-123-123 1-800-123-123 text in text 1-800-123-123 text --------------------------------------- n0OOOOOOOOOOOO h1iiiiiiiiiiiii in text +l-800-123-123 1-8oo-I23-i23 text in text +1 (800)-l23-123 text phone \'012345678\', \'0123456789\', \'01234567891\', \'012345678912\', \'0123456789123\', \'01234567891234\', \'012345678912345\', \'800-1234567\', \'8Oo-I234567-l\', \'+1(222)3334444\', \'+1 (222) 333 4444\', \'+1 ( 222 ) 333 4444\', \'+1-222-333-4444\', \'+1 222 333 4444\', \'236 - 332 - 6669\', \'(604)123-4567\', \'604 123 4567\', \'604_123_4567\', \'2368337551\', \'12223334444\', \'222) 333 4444\', \'3333 4444\', \'(437)1234567\', \'(888)1234123\', not a phone \'0\', \'01\', \'012\', \'0123\', \'01234\', \'012345\', \'0123456\', \'01234567\', \'90-60-90\', \'90/60/90\', \'0123456789123456\', \'+X (XXX) XXX XXXX\', \'1/23-4\', \'1 / 23 - 4\', \'1234/12,3-1234\''; my $regex = qr/(:?\+[Il]* ?)?[\d()–-][\d ()\-"–OОli_|]{6,20}[\dOОli|]\d/mip; if ( $str =~ /$regex/g ) { print "Whole match is ${^MATCH} and its start/end positions can be obtained via \$-[0] and \$+[0]\n"; # print "Capture Group 1 is $1 and its start/end positions can be obtained via \$-[1] and \$+[1]\n"; # print "Capture Group 2 is $2 ... and so on\n"; } # ${^POSTMATCH} and ${^PREMATCH} are also available with the use of '/p' # Named capture groups can be called via $+{name}

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 Perl, please visit: http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html