RegEx for matching UK Postcodes

Question

I\'m after a regex that will validate a full complex UK postcode only within an input string. All of the uncommon postcode forms must be covered as well as the usual. For in

Answer 1

Through empirical testing and observation, as well as confirming with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcodes_in_the_United_Kingdom#Validation, here is my version of a Python regex that correctly parses and validates a UK postcode:

UK_POSTCODE_REGEX = r'(?P[A-Z]{1,2})(?P(?:[0-9]{1,2})|(?:[0-9][A-Z]))(?P[0-9])(?P[A-Z]{2})'

This regex is simple and has capture groups. It does not include all of the validations of legal UK postcodes, but only takes into account the letter vs number positions.

Here is how I would use it in code:

@dataclass
class UKPostcode:
    postcode_area: str
    district: str
    sector: int
    postcode: str

    # https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcodes_in_the_United_Kingdom#Validation
    # Original author of this regex: @jontsai
    # NOTE TO FUTURE DEVELOPER:
    # Verified through empirical testing and observation, as well as confirming with the Wiki article
    # If this regex fails to capture all valid UK postcodes, then I apologize, for I am only human.
    UK_POSTCODE_REGEX = r'(?P[A-Z]{1,2})(?P(?:[0-9]{1,2})|(?:[0-9][A-Z]))(?P[0-9])(?P[A-Z]{2})'

    @classmethod
    def from_postcode(cls, postcode):
        """Parses a string into a UKPostcode

        Returns a UKPostcode or None
        """
        m = re.match(cls.UK_POSTCODE_REGEX, postcode.replace(' ', ''))

        if m:
            uk_postcode = UKPostcode(
                postcode_area=m.group('postcode_area'),
                district=m.group('district'),
                sector=m.group('sector'),
                postcode=m.group('postcode')
            )
        else:
            uk_postcode = None

        return uk_postcode


def parse_uk_postcode(postcode):
    """Wrapper for UKPostcode.from_postcode
    """
    uk_postcode = UKPostcode.from_postcode(postcode)
    return uk_postcode

Here are unit tests:

@pytest.mark.parametrize(
    'postcode, expected', [
        # https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcodes_in_the_United_Kingdom#Validation
        (
            'EC1A1BB',
            UKPostcode(
                postcode_area='EC',
                district='1A',
                sector='1',
                postcode='BB'
            ),
        ),
        (
            'W1A0AX',
            UKPostcode(
                postcode_area='W',
                district='1A',
                sector='0',
                postcode='AX'
            ),
        ),
        (
            'M11AE',
            UKPostcode(
                postcode_area='M',
                district='1',
                sector='1',
                postcode='AE'
            ),
        ),
        (
            'B338TH',
            UKPostcode(
                postcode_area='B',
                district='33',
                sector='8',
                postcode='TH'
            )
        ),
        (
            'CR26XH',
            UKPostcode(
                postcode_area='CR',
                district='2',
                sector='6',
                postcode='XH'
            )
        ),
        (
            'DN551PT',
            UKPostcode(
                postcode_area='DN',
                district='55',
                sector='1',
                postcode='PT'
            )
        )
    ]
)
def test_parse_uk_postcode(postcode, expected):
    uk_postcode = parse_uk_postcode(postcode)
    assert(uk_postcode == expected)