Replace3 chars · /g
Regex to Replace Repeated Whitespace
Use this before `.replace()` when normalizing messy copy, scraped text, or imported CSV fields with inconsistent spacing.
The expression
/\s+/gHow to read it
\s matches any whitespace, including tabs and newlines.
g — global — keep going after the first match instead of stopping
Find matches in your own text
no inputTry:
This expression is unanchored, so it finds every occurrence anywhere in the text. Highlighted runs are what a replace call would rewrite.
Examples, checked in your browser
4/4 verifiedtoo many spaces
Matches 2 times.
line breaks count too
Matches 3 times.
single-space
No match — this is the kind of input the pattern rejects.
clean
No match — this is the kind of input the pattern rejects.
Use it in code
3 languagesJavaScript
const regex = /\s+/g;
regex.test(input);Python
import re
pattern = re.compile(r"\s+")
bool(pattern.search(input))Go
re := regexp.MustCompile("\\s+")
matched := re.MatchString(input)Other replace patterns
3GroupReplace
Flags/g
Examples4
SafetyOK