I have a list of names and I am looking to filter the list to only return names that contains both the last and first names.

Let's say I am looking for "Joe Doe"

I have the current regex (?:^|\s)Joe|(?:^|\s)Doe

It somewhat works but it is returning all the strings that contains either Joe or Doe. I would like it to match the names that contains both names only, and it could be either "Doe Joe" or "Joe Doe"

I have a list of names and I am looking to filter the list to only return names that contains both the last and first names.

Let's say I am looking for "Joe Doe"

I have the current regex (?:^|\s)Joe|(?:^|\s)Doe

It somewhat works but it is returning all the strings that contains either Joe or Doe. I would like it to match the names that contains both names only, and it could be either "Doe Joe" or "Joe Doe"

• javascript
• regex

Share Improve this question Follow asked Oct 16, 2013 at 19:47 NewtonNewton 24511 gold badge55 silver badges1111 bronze badges 2

• is your first name and last name always separated by whitespace? – Rohit Jain Commented Oct 16, 2013 at 19:49
• Not always, there are cases where I have hyphenated names – Newton Commented Oct 16, 2013 at 19:51

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1 Answer 1

Sorted by: Reset to default 8

This lookahead based regex should work:

/(?=.*?\bJoe\b)(?=.*?\bDoe\b).*/i

Testing:

/(?=.*?\bJoe\b)(?=.*?\bDoe\b).*/.test('Joe Doe'); // true
/(?=.*?\bJoe\b)(?=.*?\bDoe\b).*/.test('Doe Joe'); // true