Remove the first N characters from a String in JavaScript

# Table of Contents

1. Remove the first N characters from a String using String.slice()
2. Remove the first N characters from a String using String.substring()
3. Remove the first N characters from a string conditionally

# Remove the first N characters from a String using String.slice()

To remove the first N characters from a string, call the slice() method, passing it N as an argument.

For example, const removeFirst2 = str.slice(2); removes the first 2 characters from the string.

Copied!
const str = 'bobbyhadz.com';

// ✅ remove the first 2 characters from a string
const removeFirst2 = str.slice(2);
console.log(removeFirst2); // 👉️ bbyhadz.com

// ✅ remove the first 3 characters from a string
const removeFirst3 = str.slice(3);
console.log(removeFirst3); // 👉️ byhadz.com

The String.slice() method extracts a section of a string and returns it, without modifying the original string.

The String.slice() method takes the following arguments:

When only a single argument is passed to the String.slice() method, the slice goes to the end of the string.

For example, to remove the first 2 characters from a string, you would specify a start index of 2.

Copied!
const str = 'bobbyhadz.com';

const removeFirst2 = str.slice(2);
console.log(removeFirst2); // 👉️ bbyhadz.com

A start index of 2 excludes the first 2 characters from the result because the new slice skips the characters at indexes 0 and 1.

Similarly, to remove the first characters from the string, use a start index of 3.

Copied!
const str = 'bobbyhadz.com';

const removeFirst3 = str.slice(3);
console.log(removeFirst3); // 👉️ byhadz.com

The new slice doesn't contain the first 3 characters of the original string (indexes 0, 1 and 2).

Note that the String.slice() method doesn't change the original string, it returns a new string. Strings are immutable in JavaScript.

Copied!
const str = 'bobbyhadz.com';

const removeFirst2 = str.slice(2);
console.log(removeFirst2); // 👉️ bbyhadz.com

console.log(str); // 👉️ bobbyhadz.com

The original string remains unchanged after calling slice().

If you try to remove more characters than there are in the string, the slice() method returns an empty string.

Copied!
const str = 'bobbyhadz.com';

const removeFirst100 = str.slice(100);
console.log(removeFirst100); // 👉️ ""

We tried to remove the first 100 characters from a string that only contains 13 characters, so the slice() method returned an empty string.

If you have to do this often, define a reusable function.

Copied!
function removeFirstN(str, n) {
  return str.slice(n);
}

const str = 'bobbyhadz.com';

console.log(removeFirstN(str, 2)); // 👉️ bbyhadz.com

console.log(removeFirstN(str, 3)); // 👉️ byhadz.com

The removeFirstN function takes a string and n as parameters and removes the first N characters from the string.

# Remove the first N characters from a String using String.substring()

Alternatively, you can use the String.substring() method.

Copied!
const str = 'bobbyhadz.com';

const removeFirst2 = str.substring(2);
console.log(removeFirst2); // 👉️ bbyhadz.com

const removeFirst3 = str.substring(3);
console.log(removeFirst3); // 👉️ byhadz.com

The String.substring() method returns a slice of the string from the start index to the excluding end index.

The method takes the following parameters:

If no end index is specified the slice goes to the end of the string.

We used the slice() and substring() methods in a similar way to remove the first N characters from a string.

However, there are a couple of differences between the String.substring() and the String.slice() methods:

• The substring() method swaps its start and end index if the start index is greater than the end index. The slice() method returns an empty string in this case.

Copied!
const str = 'bobby';

console.log(str.substring(3, 0)); // 👉️ bob

console.log(str.slice(3, 0)); // 👉️ ''

• If either of both arguments passed to substring() are negative, they are treated as if they were 0.

Copied!
const str = 'bobby';

console.log(str.substring(-3)); // 👉️ bobby

console.log(str.slice(-3)); // 👉️ bby

When given a negative index, the slice() method counts backward from the end of the string to find the indexes.

The slice() method is implemented more intuitively and should be your approach.

# Remove the first N characters from a string conditionally

Use the String.replace() method to remove the first N characters from a string conditionally.

The method will only remove the first N characters from the string if the string starts with the specified characters.

Copied!
const str = 'bobbyhadz.com';

// ✅ remove the first 2 characters from a string conditionally
const removeFirst2 = str.replace(/^bo/, '');
console.log(removeFirst2); // 👉️ bbyhadz.com

// ✅ remove the first 3 characters from a string conditionally
const removeFirst3 = str.replace(/^bob/, '');
console.log(removeFirst3); // 👉️ byhadz.com

The String.replace() method returns a new string with one, some, or all matches of a regular expression replaced with the provided replacement.

The method takes the following parameters:

The first argument we passed to the String.replace() method is a regular expression.

The forward slashes / / mark the beginning and end of the regular expression.

Copied!
const str = 'bobbyhadz.com';

const removeFirst2 = str.replace(/^bo/, '');
console.log(removeFirst2); // 👉️ bbyhadz.com

The caret ^ matches the beginning of the input.

We specified the characters bo in the example.

In other words, the bo characters are only matched if they are at the beginning of the string.

We replace the match with an empty string in order to remove the characters.

If the string doesn't start with the specified characters, the entire string is returned as is.

Copied!
const str = 'bobbyhadz.com';

const result = str.replace(/^xyz/, '');
console.log(result); // 👉️ bobbyhadz.com

The String.replace() method returns a new string with the matches of the pattern replaced. The method doesn't change the original string.

Strings are immutable in JavaScript.

# Additional Resources

You can learn more about the related topics by checking out the following tutorials:

• Remove file extension from a String using JavaScript
• Remove First and Last Characters from a String in JavaScript
• Remove the last Comma from a String in JavaScript
• Remove the last N Characters from a String in JavaScript
• Remove the leading Zeros from a String in JavaScript
• Remove all non-alphanumeric Characters from a String in JS