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

r"
"
gx

Test String

Code Generator

Generated Code

import java.util.regex.Matcher; import java.util.regex.Pattern; public class Example { public static void main(String[] args) { final String regex = "(?<!\\d)\n" + " (?:\n" + " [0-9]{4}\n" + " (?:\n" + " (?:0[1-9]|1[0-2]) (?:0[1-9]|1[0-9]|2[0-8])\n" + " |(?:0[13-9]|1[0-2]) (?:29|30)\n" + " |(?:0[13578]|1[02]) (?:31)\n" + " )\n" + " |\n" + " (?:\n" + " [0-9]{2}\n" + " (?:\n" + " 0[48]\n" + " |[2468][048]\n" + " |[13579][26]\n" + " )\n" + " |(?:\n" + " 0[48]\n" + " |[2468][048]\n" + " |[13579][26]\n" + " )00\n" + " )\n" + " 02 (?:29)\n" + " )\n" + "(?!\\d)\n"; final String string = "aaa_20150229_bbb\n" + "aaa_2012-02-29_bbb\n" + "aaa_2000-02-29_bbb\n" + "aaa_20000229_bbb\n" + "20000228\n" + "2000-2-28\n" + "19120229\n" + "19000229\n\n\n" + "1696-2-29\n" + "16960229\n\n" + "20190228\n\n" + "aaa_1904229_bbb\n" + "aaa_18000229_bbb\n" + "aaa_17000229_bbb\n" + "aaa_16000229_bbb\n\n" + "2019-3-30\n" + "19960229\n" + "2019-02-28\n" + "20190228\n" + "20190229\n\n\n" + "aaa_20150130_bbb\n" + "aaa_20150131_bbb\n" + "aaa_2015-04-30_bbb\n" + "aaa_20150430_bbb\n" + "20190228\n" + "20190229\n" + "20200229\n" + "20000229\n" + "2000-02-29\n" + "2000-02-28\n\n" + "201911"; final Pattern pattern = Pattern.compile(regex, Pattern.COMMENTS); final Matcher matcher = pattern.matcher(string); while (matcher.find()) { System.out.println("Full match: " + matcher.group(0)); for (int i = 1; i <= matcher.groupCount(); i++) { System.out.println("Group " + i + ": " + matcher.group(i)); } } } }

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 Java, please visit: https://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/util/regex/Pattern.html