String Search

Find text inside strings with includes, indexOf and more.

Syntaxstr.includes('text') str.indexOf('text')

You can search inside strings:

  • includes() — returns true if the text is found.
  • indexOf() — returns the position, or -1 if not found.
  • startsWith() / endsWith() — check the beginning or end.

Example

Try it yourself
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When to use it

  • Find the position of a search keyword within article text to scroll it into view.
  • Test whether a filename ends with .pdf before allowing it to be uploaded.
  • Extract a query parameter value from a URL string using indexOf and slice.

More examples

indexOf to find a substring

Uses indexOf to locate 'port' within a log message, returning -1 if not present.

Example · js
const text = "Error: connection refused at port 5432";
const idx = text.indexOf("port");
console.log(idx);          // 30
console.log(idx !== -1 ? "found" : "not found");

search with a regex

Uses search() with a regular expression to find the position of a 4-digit year in a filename.

Example · js
const filename = "report_2024-Q3.xlsx";
const pos = filename.search(/\d{4}/);
console.log(pos); // 7 – position of the 4-digit year

match to extract substrings

Uses match() with the global flag to extract all IP addresses from a log string into an array.

Example · js
const log = "IPs: 192.168.1.1 and 10.0.0.5";
const ips = log.match(/\d+\.\d+\.\d+\.\d+/g);
console.log(ips); // ["192.168.1.1", "10.0.0.5"]

Discussion

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String Search — JavaScript | SoundsCode