# Repeater clarification

**URL:** <https://community.mp3tag.de/t/repeater-clarification/43095>\
**Category:** Support\
**Created:** [September 26, 2018, 6:18am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/repeater-clarification/43095 "2018-09-26T06:18:31Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![chad](https://community.mp3tag.de/user_avatar/community.mp3tag.de/chad/32/5696_2.png) [@chad](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/chad)\
**Post date:** [September 26, 2018, 6:18am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/repeater-clarification/43095/1 "2018-09-26T06:18:31Z")

</div>

For a very long time, I've had a question about regular expression repeaters. What is the difference between  
`[xyz+]`  
and  
`[xyz]+`  
?

(or between [xyz?] and [xyz]? - or of course same question using \* )

Is one wrong and the other correct, or do they have their own valid meaning?

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Florian](https://community.mp3tag.de/user_avatar/community.mp3tag.de/florian/32/5759_2.png) [@Florian](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/Florian)\
**Post date:** [September 26, 2018, 6:33am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/repeater-clarification/43095/2 "2018-09-26T06:33:08Z")

</div>

Both are correct regular expressions, but only the latter treats the `+` character as quantifier.

`[xyz+]` matches a single character present in the given list (including the `+` character).  
`[xyz]+` matches between one and unlimited occurrences of the characters present in the given list.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![LyricsLover](https://community.mp3tag.de/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/l/c6cbf5/32.png) [@LyricsLover](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/LyricsLover)\
**Post date:** [September 26, 2018, 6:43am UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/repeater-clarification/43095/3 "2018-09-26T06:43:17Z")

</div>

> [@chad](#):
>
> or do they have their own valid meaning?

An other way to get a detailled explanation:  
Enter your regex in one of the online regex tester like

> **[regex101: build, test, and debug regex](https://regex101.com/)**
>
> Regular expression tester with syntax highlighting, explanation, cheat sheet for PHP/PCRE, Python, GO, JavaScript, Java, C#/.NET, Rust.

There you can enter some text and see immediately how your regular expression would match (or not) a part of your text.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![devfr](https://community.mp3tag.de/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@devfr](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/devfr)\
**Post date:** [September 27, 2018, 1:57pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/repeater-clarification/43095/4 "2018-09-27T13:57:29Z")

</div>

Hi, you can visit this website to learn regular expression syntax : [https://www.regular-expressions.info/quickstart.html](https://www.regular-expressions.info/quickstart.html)  
And visit this website to test regular expression: [https://extendsclass.com/regex-tester.html](https://extendsclass.com/regex-tester.html)

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![system](https://community.mp3tag.de/uploads/default/original/2X/c/ce7035d426cb755a7916793326d23b465222a407.png) [@system](https://community.mp3tag.de/u/system)\
**Post date:** [February 9, 2026, 12:27pm UTC](https://community.mp3tag.de/t/repeater-clarification/43095/5 "2026-02-09T12:27:41Z")

</div>