DroidScript

The match() method retrieves the matches when matching a string against a regular expression.

Syntax

str.match(regexp)

Parameters

regexp

A regular expression object. If a non-RegExp object obj is passed, it is implicitly converted to a RegExp by using new RegExp(obj).

Return value

array

An Array containing the matched results or null if there were no matches.

Description

If the regular expression does not include the g flag, returns the same result as RegExp.exec(). The returned Array has an extra input property, which contains the original string that was parsed. In addition, it has an index property, which represents the zero-based index of the match in the string.

If the regular expression includes the g flag, the method returns an Array containing all matched substrings rather than match objects. Captured groups are not returned. If there were no matches, the method returns null.

See also: RegExp methods

• If you need to know if a string matches a regular expression RegExp, use search().
• If you only want the first match found, you might want to use RegExp.exec() instead.
• if you want to obtain capture groups and the global flag is set, you need to use RegExp.exec() instead.

Examples

Using match()

In the following example, match() is used to find 'Chapter' followed by 1 or more numeric characters followed by a decimal point and numeric character 0 or more times. The regular expression includes the i flag so that case will be ignored.

var str = 'For more information, see Chapter 3.4.5.1';
var re = /(chapter \d+(\.\d)*)/i;
var found = str.match(re);

console.log(found);

// logs ['Chapter 3.4.5.1', 'Chapter 3.4.5.1', '.1']

// 'Chapter 3.4.5.1' is the first match and the first value 
// remembered from `(Chapter \d+(\.\d)*)`.

// '.1' is the last value remembered from `(\.\d)`.

Using global and ignore case flags with match()

The following example demonstrates the use of the global and ignore case flags with match(). All letters A through E and a through e are returned, each its own element in the array.

var str = 'ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz';
var regexp = /[A-E]/gi;
var matches_array = str.match(regexp);

console.log(matches_array);
// ['A', 'B', 'C', 'D', 'E', 'a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e']

Firefox-specific notes

• Starting with Gecko 27 , this method has been adjusted to conform with the ECMAScript specification. When match() is called with a global regular expression, the RegExp.lastIndex property (if specified) will be reset to 0 ().
• Starting with Gecko 39 , the non-standard flags argument is deprecated and throws a console warning (). This property is Gecko-only and will be removed in the future.

 Created by Mozilla Contributors and licensed under CC-BY-SA 2.5