Regular expressions apps for Mac

Regular expressions are a good tool for text automation. Which apps would you recommend to try regular expressions on a Mac? RegExRX is a good one, but it is not optimized for High Sierra and perhaps will not work in the future.

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I don’t have a recommendation to pass along yet, but have recently been spending some time with Expressions.

There’s a free trial available and it’s included in Setapp.

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Not an app, but a website, Regular Expressions 101 is an online playground where you can build and test regular expressions. You can also choose the “flavor” of regex that you are targeting (i.e., php, javascriot, python, golang).

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Another vote for Regular Expressions 101. It’s my goto and because it is web based so I can use it on pretty much any platform I might be working on at the time :sunglasses:

@misterharrycrumm’s observation about the language/flavour variance is a key feature to be aware of and it is absolutely the difference between pulling your hair out and sitting back with a smug look on your face.

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Thank you for your suggestion. I have been playing around with Expressions. It is quit basic, but has a nice, clean interface, allows to save user’s RegEx and includes a good cheat sheet.

Thank you (thanks also to @misterharrycrumm . Regular Expressions 101 is great an free. Of course an internet connection is needed, but is good that I can also use it on iOS. The ability to choose the “flavour” is very useful.

You’re very welcome, @Pedro. I appreciate you sharing some feedback on Expressions.

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Been a while since I last used it, but I’ve used Patterns often

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Thank you, @martijnengler I will give it a try.

Bit late, but +1 for Patterns

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A note from the developer about RegExRX getting updated to 64 bit…

Kem Tekinay Aug 9 Pre-Release Testers, Xojo Pro, XDC Speakers New York
Yeah, yeah… :slight_smile:

I rely on it too, so it will be updated before it makes a difference.

I know of Tekinay through his contributions on the Xojo forum. I would not be too concerned. He seems to be a reliable fellow. I think it is highly unlikely that RegExRX will not be updated in time for the next OS update.

It is also a good app.

I am also using RegExRX (iTunes link) and Regex Knife (iTunes link) on my devices, as well as the excellent Regex 101…

My own path to Regular Expressions was having the need arise and then using BBEdit to process text files using RegEx. The Find/Replace function in BBEdit accepts RegEx entries. It is a good learning environment. You can try out various things and see how they work. It is very fast; I was dealing with huge documents.
Basically, you supply a RegEx expression to some text document and see how it works. The feedback is immediate. The parsing done by BBEdit (colorizes elements of the expression provided) is sufficient and very helpful in learning.
BBEdit is a great program for many reasons. As a tool for learning/using RegEx expressions I found it superb. It is a lot easier to try things out in this environment and getting instant feedback than it is to be entering code in some programming language.

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Hi everyone :wave:

Sorry for reviving an old thread, but I thought this might still be useful for anyone looking for regex tools on Mac.

I’m an indie dev who loves working with regular expressions, and I recently launched a macOS app called Regex Forge that’s built specifically for working with regex on Mac. It features a clean native interface with syntax highlighting and live preview, a handy regex cheat sheet, and a visual pattern inspector that helps break down your expressions into understandable parts, and more.

While it is a paid app, it comes with a 30-day free trial so you can explore everything it offers before deciding if it’s a good fit.

Would love for you to check it out!