Sentry Answers>JavaScript>

Split a string in JavaScript

Split a string in JavaScript

David Y.

—

The problemJump To Solution

How do I split a string in JavaScript?

The solution

We can use JavaScript’s String.prototype.split() method. When called on a string, this will split the string at every instance of the provided separator, discard the separator, and return an array of substrings. The following code provides an example:

Click to Copy
const myString = "This is a sentence.";
const words = myString.split(" "); // split on single space characters

console.log(words); // will output ["This", "is", "a", "sentence."]

The separator can be a string or a regular expression, so we could also do something like this:

Click to Copy
const myString = "This is a sentence.";
const words = myString.split(/[ t]/); // split on single space characters and lowercase t's

console.log(words); // will output ["This", "is", "a", "sen", "ence."]

If we would like to retain the separator when splitting, we can use a regular expression with a positive lookahead assertion, as below:

Click to Copy
const myString = "This is a sentence.";
const words = myString.split(/(?= )/); // split on but retain single space characters

console.log(words); // will output ["This", " is", " a", " sentence."]

We can also truncate the final array by setting the optional limit parameter:

Click to Copy
const myString = "This is a sentence.";
const words = myString.split(" "); // split on single space characters
words.length = 3;

console.log(words); // will output ["This", "is", "a"]
  • ResourcesImprove Web Browser Performance - Find the JavaScript code causing slowdowns
  • ResourcesJavaScript Frontend Error Monitoring 101
  • Syntax.fm logo
    Listen to the Syntax Podcast

    Tasty Treats for Web Developers brought to you by Sentry. Web development tips and tricks hosted by Wes Bos and Scott Tolinski

    Listen to Syntax

Loved by over 4 million developers and more than 90,000 organizations worldwide, Sentry provides code-level observability to many of the world’s best-known companies like Disney, Peloton, Cloudflare, Eventbrite, Slack, Supercell, and Rockstar Games. Each month we process billions of exceptions from the most popular products on the internet.

learn more about sentryjoin our discord
© 2024 • Sentry is a registered Trademark
of Functional Software, Inc.