Regex.Matches

This C# method returns multiple Match objects. It matches multiple instances of a pattern and returns a MatchCollection.

C# method use

Matches() is useful for extracting values, based on a pattern, when many are expected. Often more than just one Match can be found.

To start, this program uses an input string that contains several words. Each one starts with the letter s. Next, we use Regex.Matches on this string.

using System;
using System.Text.RegularExpressions;

class Program
{
    static void Main()
    {
        // Input string.
        const string value = @"said shed see spear spread super";

        // Get a collection of matches.
        MatchCollection matches = Regex.Matches(value, @"s\w+d");

        // Use foreach-loop.
        foreach (Match match in matches)
        {
            foreach (Capture capture in match.Captures)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("Index={0}, Value={1}", capture.Index, capture.Value);
            }
        }
    }
}
Index=0, Value=said
Index=5, Value=shed
Index=20, Value=spread

Matches, Match

With Regex.Matches, we gather a group of matches (a MatchCollection) which must be iterated over. If only one Match is needed, Regex.Match is simpler to use.

Summary

The Regex.Matches method provides a way to match multiple times in a single input string. You can then loop over these matches and their individual captures to get all the results.

Final note

Matches() is similar to Regex.Match. Doing this sort of text processing would be more cumbersome if you were to use string class methods.