RegEx for detecting base64 encoded strings

Question

I need to detect strings with the form @base64 (e.g. @VGhpcyBpcyBhbiBlbmNvZGVkIHN0cmluZw==) in my application.

The @ has to be at the begin

Answer 1

Something like this should do (does not check for proper length!):

^@[a-zA-Z0-9+/]+={,2}$

---

The length of any base64 encoded string must be a multiple of 4, hence the additional.

See here for a solution that checks against proper length: RegEx to parse or validate Base64 data

A quick explanation of the regex from the linked answer:

^@ #match "@" at beginning of string
(?:[A-Za-z0-9+/]{4})* #match any number of 4-letter blocks of the base64 char set
(?:
    [A-Za-z0-9+/]{2}== #match 2-letter block of the base64 char set followed by "==", together forming a 4-letter block
| # or
    [A-Za-z0-9+/]{3}= #match 3-letter block of the base64 char set followed by "=", together forming a 4-letter block
)?
$ #match end of string

Answer 2

Here's an alternative regular expression:

^@(?=(.{4})*$)[A-Za-z0-9+/]*={0,2}$

It satisfies the following conditions:

• The string length after the @ sign must be a multiple of four - (?=^(.{4})*$)
• The content must be alphanumeric characters or + or / - [A-Za-z0-9+/]*
• It can have up to two padding (=) characters on the end - ={0,2}

Answer 3

try with:

^@(?:[A-Za-z0-9+/]{4})*(?:[A-Za-z0-9+/]{2}==|[A-Za-z0-9+/]{3}=)?$

=> RegEx to parse or validate Base64 data