How to Split a String in Rust? (Explained with Examples)

Regardless of the programming language, splitting a string is a common practice that programmers, developers, and software engineers will have to do at some point during their careers. In this article, we are going to explain how to split a string using Rust programming language, and the different alternatives available.

Note: While the main question is to split a string in Rust, this article presents different ways to split string slices. Do not confuse a string with a string slice.

How to Split a String Slice Using the split() Method

To split a string slice or type &str in Rust, use the split() method to create an iterator. Once the iterator is generated, use a for loop to access each substring to apply any additional business logic. Let’s look at this implementation in the following snippet of code.

use std::str::Split;

fn main() {
    let text: &str = "Manchester Bogota Paris Dallas Chicago";
    let cities: Split<&str> = text.split(" ");

    for city in cities {
        println!("City {}", city);        
    }
}

// or
 
fn main() {
    let cities: Split<&str> = "Manchester Bogota Paris Dallas Chicago".split(" ");

    for city in cities {
        println!("City {}", city);        
    }
}

// Output
// City Manchester
// City Bogota
// City Paris
// City Dallas
// City Chicago

Notice how we logged each city after splitting them by a space character " ". The split() method can accept another separator as an argument besides the space character. For instance, we could extract the sentences of a paragraph by separating them with a period"." .

fn main() {
   let paragraphs = "Lorem ipsum dolor. Ut enim ad minim veniam. Duis aute irure . Excepteur sint.".split(".");

    for paragraph in paragraphs {
        println!("Paragraph {}", paragraph);        
    }
}

// Output
// Paragraph Lorem ipsum dolor
// Paragraph  Ut enim ad minim veniam
// Paragraph  Duis aute irure
// Paragraph  Excepteur sint
// Paragraph

Unfortunately, the last example would introduce a logical error as it displays an empty string for the last element. To quickly fix this, check for empty strings by leveraging the is_empty() method on the string slice paragraph.

fn main() {
    let paragraphs =
        "Lorem ipsum dolor. Ut enim ad minim veniam. Duis aute irure . Excepteur sint.".split(".");

    for paragraph in paragraphs {
        if (!paragraph.is_empty()) {
            println!("Paragraph {}", paragraph);
        }
    }
}

How to Split a String Slice Using the split_whitespace() Method

In the previous example, we used the split() method to split a string slice separated by spaces. Rust provides a built-in method that does the same, without the need of passing whitespace as a parameter, called split_whitespace().

use std::str::SplitWhitespace;

fn main() {
    let cities: SplitWhitespace = "Manchester Bogota Paris Dallas Chicago".split_whitespace();

    for city in cities {
        println!("City {}", city);        
    }
}

Note: In case you decide to update from using the split() method to using the split_whitespace() method, make sure to also update the type of the variable, in our case cities to SplitWhiteSpace.

How to Split a String Slice Using the split_terminator() Method

Remember when we used the split() method to split sentences in a paragraph? We had to apply additional logic to check for empty substrings after using the split method. This is what the solution looked like.

fn main() {
    let paragraphs =
        "Lorem ipsum dolor. Ut enim ad minim veniam. Duis aute irure . Excepteur sint.".split(".");

    for paragraph in paragraphs {
        if (!paragraph.is_empty()) {
            println!("Paragraph {}", paragraph);
        }
    }
}

Notice how it checks whether the substring paragraph is empty prior to printing it in the terminal. We can avoid this check by using the split_terminator() method instead of the split() method.

The split_terminator() method is the equivalent to the split method, except that substrings are skipped if they are empty. Hence, by using the split_terminator() method, we no longer have to check for empty strings. Let’s look at the new implementation of the code.

fn main() {
    let paragraphs =
        "Lorem ipsum dolor. Ut enim ad minim veniam. Duis aute irure . Excepteur sint.".split_terminator(".");

    for paragraph in paragraphs {
        println!("Paragraph {}", paragraph);
    }
}

How to Generate a Growable Array After Splitting a String Slice

In case you don’t want to use a for loop, but instead, generate a collection or a growable array (Vec<&str>), apply the split() method on the string slice followed by the collect() method once the iterator is generated.

fn main() {
    let text: &str = "Manchester Bogota Paris Dallas Chicago";
    let cities: Split<&str> = text.split(" ");
    let array_cities: Vec<&str> = cities.collect();
}

// or

fn main() {
   let array_cities: Vec<&str> = "Manchester Bogota Paris Dallas Chicago"
        .split(" ")
        .collect();
}

Conclusion

While it is common to use the split() method to split a string slice, there are other built-in methods available that already simplify the job such as using split_whitespace(), in case we split by whitespace, or using the split_terminator(), in case we want to skip empty substrings.

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