Anchors
Anchors match positions, not characters. ^ matches the start, $ the end, \b a word boundary.
Python
Intermediate
3 min read
Anchors
Example
import re
text = "cat concatenate"
# \b matches whole words
print(re.findall(r"\bcat\b", text)) # ["cat"]
# ^ and $ with re.MULTILINE
lines = "first
second
third"
starts = re.findall(r"^\w+", lines, re.M)
print(starts) # ["first", "second", "third"] Pro Tip
Use re.MULTILINE to make ^ and $ match line boundaries, not just string boundaries.