Replace multiple characters Python

In this post, you will learn how to replace multiple characters using Python programming language. In the development process, we may come to a situation where we need to replace multiple characters. There are several ways to replace multiple characters in Python, here we have mentioned some of them.

Python replace multiple characters using replace() method

The replace() method of Python returns a copy of the string where all occurrences of a substring are replaced with another substring. The syntax of the replace() method is-

string.replace(old, new, count)

Here, old is the string you search for, new is the string to replace the old value with and count is the number of times you want to replace the old substring with the new substring. In the given example, we have replaced multiple characters from a string using a nested replace() method.

# Python code to 
# Replace multiple characters at once
# with help of nested replace() method
  
# initializing string 
test_str = "This is testing string"
  
# printing original string 
print("The original string is : " + str(test_str))

replace_characters = {'i': 'A',
                      'e': 'B',
                      'n': 'C'}

# Loop over key-value pairs

for key,value in replace_characters.items():
    test_str = test_str.replace(key, value)
  
# printing result 
print("New string after replacement of characters : " + test_str)

The original string is : This is testing string
New string after replacement of characters : ThAs As tBstACg strACg

Replace multiple characters in Python using translate() + maketrans()

The translate() function of Python enables us to map the characters in a string, replacing those in one table with those in another. And, the 'maketrans()' function in the string module makes it easy to create the mapping table. The syntax of the Python translate() method is-

str.translate(table[, deletechars])

Here, the table is the required parameter. It is a translation table, created by using maketrans() function, and deletechars is the list of characters removed from the string. Here is the code to replace multiple characters in a string.

# Python code to 
# Replace multiple characters at once
# with help of  translate() + maketrans()

import string
  
# initializing string 
test_str = "This is testing string"
  
# printing original string 
print("The original string is : " + str(test_str))
  
# Using translate() + maketrans()
# Replace multiple characters at once
res = test_str.translate(test_str.maketrans("ien", "ABC"))
  
# printing result 
print("The string after replacement of positions : " + res)

The original string is : This is testing string
The string after replacement of positions : ThAs As tBstACg strACg

Python replace multiple characters using regex function

We can also use a regular expression to match white space and eliminate them using the re.sub() function.

# Python code to 
# Replace multiple characters at once
# with help of regex function

import re

# initializing string 
test_str = "This is testing string"
  
# printing original string 
print("The original string is : " + str(test_str))

replace_characters = {'i': 'A',
                      'e': 'B',
                      'n': 'C'}

# Replace multiple characters using regex
test_str = re.sub(r"[ien]",
                  lambda x: replace_characters[x.group(0)],
                  test_str)

print("New string after replacement of characters : " + test_str)

The original string is : This is testing string
New string after replacement of characters : ThAs As tBstACg strACg

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