The tables below are a reference to basic regex. While reading the rest of the site, when in doubt, you can always come back and look here. (It you want a bookmark, here's a direct link to the regex reference tables).I encourage you to print the tables so you have a cheat sheet on your desk for quick reference. Regular expression operations, Python Docs. All the images and scripts are homemade and free to use. Here the github repository where you can find the script. Here my cheat sheet again, always better when it’s for free! Python regular expression (regex) Cheat Sheet by mutanclan - Download free from Cheatography - Cheatography.com: Cheat Sheets For Every Occasion Download This Cheat Sheet (PDF). Check out our “Python RegEx Cheatsheet” to help point you in the right direction when building RegExes in Python. RegExes syntax can be hard to recall. Check out our “Python RegEx Cheatsheet” to help point you in the right direction when building RegExes in Python.
Regex Syntax¶
Characters¶| Character | Matches |
|---|
a | a character |
. | Any character (except newline) |
. | . character |
| |
* | * character |
Character Classes¶| Matches | Description |
|---|
[abcd] | Any one of the letters a through d | Set of characters |
[^abcd] | Any character but a, b, c, or d | Complement of a set of characters |
[a-d] | Any one of the letters a through d | Range of characters |
[a-dz] | Any of a, b, c, d, or z | Range of characters |
Special Sequences¶| Type | Expression | Equivalent To | Description |
|---|
| Word Character | w | [a-zA-Z0-9_] | Alphanumeric or underscore |
|---|
| Non-word Character | W | [^a-zA-Z0-9_] | Anything but a word character |
|---|
| Digit Character | d | [0-9] | Numeric |
|---|
| Non-digit Character | D | [^0-9] | Non-numeric |
|---|
| Whitespace Character | s | [tnrfv] | Whitespace |
|---|
| Non-whitespace Character | S | [^tnrfv] | Anything but a whitespace character |
|---|
Anchors¶| Anchor | Matches |
|---|
^ | Start of the string |
$ | End of the string |
b | Boundary between word and non-word characters |
Groups¶| Group Type | Expression |
|---|
| Capturing | ( ... ) |
| Non-capturing | (?: ... ) |
Quantifiers/Repetition¶| Quantifier | Modification |
|---|
{5} | Match expression exactly 5 times |
{2,5} | Match expression 2 to 5 times |
{2,} | Match expression 2 or more times |
{,5} | Match expression 0 to 5 times |
* | Match expression 0 or more times |
{,} | Match expression 0 or more times |
? | Match expression 0 or 1 times |
{0,1} | Match expression 0 or 1 times |
+ | Match expression 1 or more times |
{1,} | Match expression 1 or more times |
Non-greedy quantifiers¶| Quantifier | Modification |
|---|
{2,5}? | Match 2 to 5 times (less preferred) |
{2,}? | Match 2 or more times (less preferred) |
{,5}? | Match 0 to 5 times (less preferred) |
*? | Match 0 or more times (less preferred) |
{,}? | Match 0 or more times (less preferred) |
?? | Match 0 or 1 times (less preferred) |
{0,1}? | Match 0 or 1 times (less preferred) |
+? | Match 1 or more times (less preferred) |
{1,}? | Match 1 or more times (less preferred) |
Alternators¶| Quantifier | Modification |
|---|
ABC|DEF | Match string ABC or string DEF |
Lookaround¶| Quantifier | Modification |
|---|
(?=abc) | Zero-width match confirming abc will match upcoming chars |
(?!abc) | Zero-width match confirming abc will not match upcoming chars |
Python¶
functions¶| Function | Purpose | Usage |
|---|
re.search | Return a match object if pattern found in string | re.search(r'[pat]tern','string') |
re.finditer | Return an iterable of match objects (one for each match) | re.finditer(r'[pat]tern','string') |
re.findall | Return a list of all matched strings (different when capture groups) | re.findall(r'[pat]tern','string') |
re.split | Split string by regex delimeter & return string list | re.split(r'[-]','st-ring') |
re.compile | Compile a regular expression pattern for later use | re.compile(r'[pat]tern') |
flags¶| Flag | Description |
|---|
re.IGNORECASE | Match uppercase and lowercase characters interchangeably |
re.VERBOSE | Ignore whitespace characters and allow # comments |
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From docs.python: re:
Regex Cheat Sheet Pdf
A regular expression (or RE) specifies a set of strings that matches it; the functions in this module let you check if a particular string matches a given regular expression
This blog post gives an overview and examples of regular expression syntax as implemented by the re built-in module (Python 3.8+). Assume ASCII character set unless otherwise specified. This post is an excerpt from my Python re(gex)? book.
Elements that define a regular expression🔗
| Anchors | Description |
|---|
A | restricts the match to the start of string |
Z | restricts the match to the end of string |
^ | restricts the match to the start of line |
$ | restricts the match to the end of line |
n | newline character is used as line separator |
re.MULTILINE or re.M | flag to treat input as multiline string |
b | restricts the match to the start/end of words |
| word characters: alphabets, digits, underscore |
B | matches wherever b doesn't match |
^, $ and ^ will match a ^ character instead of acting as an anchor.
| Feature | Description |
|---|
| | multiple RE combined as conditional OR |
| each alternative can have independent anchors |
(RE) | group pattern(s), also a capturing group |
a(b|c)d is same as abd|acd |
(?:RE) | non-capturing group |
(?P<name>pat) | named capture group |
. | Match any character except the newline character n |
[] | Character class, matches one character among many |
| Greedy Quantifiers | Description |
|---|
* | Match zero or more times |
+ | Match one or more times |
? | Match zero or one times |
{m,n} | Match m to n times (inclusive) |
{m,} | Match at least m times |
{,n} | Match up to n times (including 0 times) |
{n} | Match exactly n times |
pat1.*pat2 | any number of characters between pat1 and pat2 |
pat1.*pat2|pat2.*pat1 | match both pat1 and pat2 in any order |
Greedy here means that the above quantifiers will match as much as possible that'll also honor the overall RE. Appending a ? to greedy quantifiers makes them non-greedy, i.e. match as minimally as possible. Quantifiers can be applied to literal characters, groups, backreferences and character classes.
Regex Cheat Sheet Python
| Character class | Description |
|---|
[aeiou] | Match any vowel |
[^aeiou] | ^ inverts selection, so this matches any consonant |
[a-f] | - defines a range, so this matches any of abcdef characters |
d | Match a digit, same as [0-9] |
D | Match non-digit, same as [^0-9] or [^d] |
w | Match word character, same as [a-zA-Z0-9_] |
W | Match non-word character, same as [^a-zA-Z0-9_] or [^w] |
s | Match whitespace character, same as [ tnrfv] |
S | Match non-whitespace character, same as [^ tnrfv] or [^s] |
| Lookarounds | Description |
|---|
| lookarounds | custom assertions, zero-width like anchors |
(?!pat) | negative lookahead assertion |
(?<!pat) | negative lookbehind assertion |
(?=pat) | positive lookahead assertion |
(?<=pat) | positive lookbehind assertion |
(?!pat1)(?=pat2) | multiple assertions can be specified in any order |
| as they mark a matching location without consuming characters |
((?!pat).)* | Negate a grouping, similar to negated character class |
| Flags | Description |
|---|
re.IGNORECASE or re.I | flag to ignore case |
re.DOTALL or re.S | allow . metacharacter to match newline character |
flags=re.S|re.I | multiple flags can be combined using | operator |
re.MULTILINE or re.M | allow ^ and $ anchors to match line wise |
re.VERBOSE or re.X | allows to use literal whitespaces for aligning purposes |
and to add comments after the # character |
escape spaces and # if needed as part of actual RE |
re.ASCII or re.A | match only ASCII characters for b, w, d, s |
| and their opposites, applicable only for Unicode patterns |
re.LOCALE or re.L | use locale settings for byte patterns and 8-bit locales |
(?#comment) | another way to add comments, not a flag |
(?flags:pat) | inline flags only for this pat, overrides flags argument |
flags is i for re.I, s for re.S, etc, except L for re.L |
(?-flags:pat) | negate flags only for this pat |
(?flags-flags:pat) | apply and negate particular flags only for this pat |
(?flags) | apply flags for whole RE, can be used only at start of RE |
anchors if any, should be specified after (?flags) |
| Matched portion | Description |
|---|
re.Match object | details like matched portions, location, etc |
m[0] or m.group(0) | entire matched portion of re.Match object m |
m[n] or m.group(n) | matched portion of nth capture group |
m.groups() | tuple of all the capture groups' matched portions |
m.span() | start and end+1 index of entire matched portion |
| pass a number to get span of that particular capture group |
can also use m.start() and m.end() |
N | backreference, gives matched portion of Nth capture group |
| applies to both search and replacement sections |
possible values: 1, 2 up to 99 provided no more digits |
g<N> | backreference, gives matched portion of Nth capture group |
possible values: g<0>, g<1>, etc (not limited to 99) |
g<0> refers to entire matched portion |
(?P<name>pat) | named capture group |
refer as 'name' in re.Match object |
refer as (?P=name) in search section |
refer as g<name> in replacement section |
groupdict | method applied on a re.Match object |
gives named capture group portions as a dict |
0 and 100 onwards are considered as octal values, hence cannot be used as backreferences.
re module functions🔗
| Function | Description |
|---|
re.search | Check if given pattern is present anywhere in input string |
Output is a re.Match object, usable in conditional expressions |
| r-strings preferred to define RE |
| Use byte pattern for byte input |
| Python also maintains a small cache of recent RE |
re.fullmatch | ensures pattern matches the entire input string |
re.compile | Compile a pattern for reuse, outputs re.Pattern object |
re.sub | search and replace |
re.sub(r'pat', f, s) | function f with re.Match object as argument |
re.escape | automatically escape all metacharacters |
re.split | split a string based on RE |
| text matched by the groups will be part of the output |
| portion matched by pattern outside group won't be in output |
re.findall | returns all the matches as a list |
| if 1 capture group is used, only its matches are returned |
| 1+, each element will be tuple of capture groups |
| portion matched by pattern outside group won't be in output |
re.finditer | iterator with re.Match object for each match |
re.subn | gives tuple of modified string and number of substitutions |
The function definitions are given below:
Regular expression examples🔗
As a good practice, always use raw strings to construct RE, unless other formats are required. This will avoid clash of special meaning of backslash character between RE and normal quoted strings.
- difference between string and line anchors
- backreferencing within search pattern
- working with matched portions
- backreferencing in replacement section
- using functions in replacement section of
re.sub
Regular Expression Tester
Regular expressions can be compiled using re.compile function, which gives back a re.Pattern object. The top level re module functions are all available as methods for this object. Compiling a regular expression helps if the RE has to be used in multiple places or called upon multiple times inside a loop (speed benefit). By default, Python maintains a small list of recently used RE, so the speed benefit doesn't apply for trivial use cases.
Python re(gex)? book🔗
Visit my repo Python re(gex)? for details about the book I wrote on Python regular expressions. The ebook uses plenty of examples to explain the concepts from the very beginning and step by step introduces more advanced concepts. The book also covers the third party module regex. The cheatsheet and examples presented in this post are based on contents of this book.
Use this leanpub link for a discounted price.