Split a String by Special Characters in JavaScript

# Split a String by Special Characters

To split a string by special characters, call the split() method on the string, passing it a regular expression that matches any of the special characters.

The method will split the string on each occurrence of a special character and will return an array containing the results.

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const str = 'a.b-c=d/e_f';

const result = str.split(/[.\-=/_]/);

// 👇️ ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd' ,'e' ,'f']
console.log(result);

The String.split() method takes a separator and splits the string into an array on each occurrence of the provided delimiter.

The String.split() method takes the following 2 parameters:

The only argument we passed to the split() method is a regular expression.

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

The square brackets [] are called a character class and match any of the characters between the brackets.

You could adjust the characters according to your use case.

The regular expression in the example matches a dot, hyphen, equal sign, forward slash and underscore.

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const str = 'a.b-c=d/e_f';

const result = str.split(/[.\-=/_]/);

// 👇️ ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd' ,'e' ,'f']
console.log(result);

Some characters, e.g. hyphens, or backslashes have to be escaped because they have a special meaning in regular expressions.

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const str = 'z=a-b\\c';

const result = str.split(/[=\-\\]/);

// 👇️ ['z', 'a', 'b', 'c']
console.log(result);

We had to escape the hyphen - and backslash \ with a backslash to treat them as literal characters.

If you need to also split on a space, you can add a space between the square brackets.

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const str = 'a.b c';

const result = str.split(/[. ]/);

// 👇️ ['a', 'b', 'c']
console.log(result);

The regular expression splits the string on each dot or space.

If you need to split on all non-letters, use the following regular expression.

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const str = 'ab.cd=ef/g';

const result = str.split(/[^a-zA-Z]/);

// 👇️ [ 'ab', 'cd', 'ef', 'g' ]
console.log(result);

The caret ^ symbol means "NOT the following".

So, the [^a-zA-Z] character class matches any character that is not a lowercase or an uppercase letter.

# A regular expression that splits on all special characters

Here's an example of a regular expression that splits the string on all special characters.

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const str = 'a.b,c-d_e=f\\g/h';

const specialChars = /[`!@#$%^&*()_+\-=\[\]{};':"\\|,.<>\/?~]/;
const result = str.split(specialChars);

// 👇️ ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g', 'h']
console.log(result);

The regular expression we used matches any special character.

You could also add a space in the square brackets if you consider a space to be a special character.

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const str = 'a.b,c-d_e=f\\g h';

//                    👇️ added space
const specialChars = /[ `!@#$%^&*()_+\-=\[\]{};':"\\|,.<>\/?~]/;
const result = str.split(specialChars);

// [
//   'a', 'b', 'c',
//   'd', 'e', 'f',
//   'g', 'h'
// ]
console.log(result);

Conversely, you could also remove any of the characters between the brackets if you don't consider them to be special characters.

If you ever need help reading a regular expression, check out this regular expression cheat sheet by MDN.

It contains a table with the name and the meaning of each special character with examples.

# Additional Resources

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

• Split a String on Capital Letters using JavaScript
• Split a String and get First or Last Array Element in JS
• Split on the Last Occurrence of a String in JavaScript
• Split a Number into an Array in JavaScript
• Split a String removing any Empty Elements in JavaScript
• Split a String at a specific Index using JavaScript
• How to Split a String by Newline in JavaScript
• How to Split a String by a Regex in JavaScript
• Split a String with multiple Separators using JavaScript
• How to Split a string by Spaces in JavaScript
• Split a String only on the First Occurrence of a Character
• Split a String every N characters in JavaScript