swiftstringnsstringsubstring

How do I check if a string contains another string in Swift?


In Objective-C the code to check for a substring in an NSString is:

NSString *string = @"hello Swift";
NSRange textRange =[string rangeOfString:@"Swift"];
if(textRange.location != NSNotFound)
{
    NSLog(@"exists");
}

But how do I do this in Swift?


Solution

  • You can do exactly the same call with Swift:

    Swift 4 & Swift 5

    In Swift 4 String is a collection of Character values, it wasn't like this in Swift 2 and 3, so you can use this more concise code1:

    let string = "hello Swift"
    if string.contains("Swift") {
        print("exists")
    }
    

    Swift 3.0+

    var string = "hello Swift"
    
    if string.range(of:"Swift") != nil { 
        print("exists")
    }
    
    // alternative: not case sensitive
    if string.lowercased().range(of:"swift") != nil {
        print("exists")
    }
    

    Older Swift

    var string = "hello Swift"
    
    if string.rangeOfString("Swift") != nil{ 
        println("exists")
    }
    
    // alternative: not case sensitive
    if string.lowercaseString.rangeOfString("swift") != nil {
        println("exists")
    }
    

    I hope this is a helpful solution since some people, including me, encountered some strange problems by calling containsString().1

    PS. Don't forget to import Foundation

    Footnotes

    1. Just remember that using collection functions on Strings has some edge cases which can give you unexpected results, e. g. when dealing with emojis or other grapheme clusters like accented letters.