Regex matching emoticons

Question

We are working on a project where we want users to be able to use both emoji syntax (like :smile:, :heart:, :confused:,:stuck_ou

Answer 1

I assume these emoticons will commonly be used with spaces before and after. Then \s might be what you're looking for, as it represents a white space.

Then your regex would become

\s+(\:\)|\:\(|<3|\:\/|\:-\/|\:\||\:p)\s