Regular Expressions 101

Pro

^start of line

Non-Capturing Group(?:\*|\*?\p{L}+(?:\h+\p{L}*)*+\*?)

1st Alternative\*

\*the literal * (42₁₀ / 52₈ / 2A₁₆)

2nd Alternative\*?\p{L}+(?:\h+\p{L}*)*+\*?

\*?optionally matches the literal * (42₁₀ / 52₈ / 2A₁₆)

\p{L}+any Unicode letter, repeated at least once

Non-Capturing Group(?:\h+\p{L}*)*+

*+repeats the group contents below any number of times:

\h+any horizontal whitespace character, repeated at least once

\p{L}*any Unicode letter, repeated any number of times

\*?optionally matches the literal * (42₁₀ / 52₈ / 2A₁₆)

$end of line

Global pattern flags

g modifier: global. Finds all matches instead of stopping after the first

m modifier: multiline. Causes ^ and $ to match the start and end of each line, not only the start and end of the string

Detailed match information will be displayed here automatically.

27 tokens

^(?:\*|\*?\p{L}+(?:\h+\p{L}*)*+\*?)$

New

Accepted strings:

*city
*cit *
*
*city one
Not accepted strings:

**
*!@
%^&*

Accepted strings:

*city
*cit *
*
*city one
Not accepted strings:

**
*!@
%^&*