Tab Character in JS
Match literal tab characters — the regex behind every formatter / linter that yells about indentation.
Try it in the JS tester →Pattern
regexJS
\t (flags: g)JavaScript / ECMAScript code
jsJavaScript
const re = new RegExp("\\t", "g");
const input = " spaces\\there";
const matches = [...input.matchAll(re)];
console.log(matches.map(m => m[0]));Uses `String.prototype.matchAll` for global iteration (Node 12+ / all modern browsers).
How the pattern works
\t is the escape for the tab character (U+0009). The g flag finds every occurrence. Pair with `replace(re, ' ')` for tabs-to-spaces conversion or use it as a detector to flag mixed indentation.
Examples
Input
spaces\thereMatches
\t
Input
\t\tdouble tabMatches
\t\t
Input
no tabs at allNo match
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