Webflags: g

HTML Tag Matcher

Match paired HTML tags and capture the tag name and inner content using a back-reference.

Try it in RegexPro →

Available in

JSSupported

JavaScript / ECMAScript

Browser-native RegExp. Default if you don't pick.

PYSupported

Python (re)

CPython stdlib `re`. Unicode-aware `\w` and `\d` by default.

GOSee workaround

Go (RE2)

Linear-time matching. No backreferences or lookarounds.

Pattern

regexengine-agnostic
<([a-zA-Z][a-zA-Z0-9]*)\b[^>]*>([\s\S]*?)<\/\1>   (flags: g)

Raw source: <([a-zA-Z][a-zA-Z0-9]*)\b[^>]*>([\s\S]*?)<\/\1>

How it works

Group 1 captures the tag name. [^>]* matches attributes. [\s\S]*? lazily captures inner content. \1 back-references the opening tag name to ensure the closing tag matches.

Examples

Input

<p>Hello world</p>

Matches

  • <p>Hello world</p>

Input

<div class="box">content</div>

Matches

  • <div class="box">content</div>

Common use cases

  • •Basic HTML parsing and extraction
  • •Template content replacement
  • •Static site content scraping
  • •Email template processing

Related patterns

HTML Attribute

Web

Match HTML attributes of the form name="value" or name='value' and capture both parts.

HTML Comment

Web

Match HTML comments, including multi-line comments and empty ones.

HTML Entity

Web

Match HTML entities in named (`&amp;`), numeric (`&#123;`), or hex (`&#x1F4A9;`) form.

Cookie Header Value

Web

Parse name=value pairs from an HTTP `Cookie:` header value.

Related concepts

Custom Character Sets: [abc], [a-z], [^abc]

Concept

Square brackets build a custom character class. [abc] matches any of a, b, or c. [a-z] is a range. A leading ^ negates the set.

Lazy vs. Greedy Quantifiers

Concept

Greedy quantifiers (*, +) consume as much as possible before backtracking. Lazy quantifiers (*?, +?) consume as little as possible.

Capturing Groups and Non-Capturing Groups

Concept

Parentheses group tokens and capture the matched substring. (?:...) groups without capturing — use it when you want grouping for quantifiers or alternation but don't need the submatch.

Regex Flags in JavaScript: g, i, m, s, u, y

Concept

Flags modify regex behavior globally. g enables global matching, i makes it case-insensitive, m changes anchor behavior, s dots match newlines, u enables Unicode, y is sticky.

How to Match Across Newlines in JavaScript

How-to

The dot doesn't match newlines by default. Use the s (dotall) flag, or build an explicit [\s\S] alternative for engines that predate s.

How to Escape Regex Special Characters

How-to

Backslash-escape any of .^$*+?()[]{}|\ to match them literally. When building a regex from user input, use a full-escape helper function.

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