Skip to content
Flint
Blog

regexConciseCharacterClassNegations

Reports negated character classes that can use shorthand escapes.

✅ This rule is included in the ts stylistic and stylisticStrict presets.

Enforces using shorthand escape sequences like \D, \W, \S, and \P instead of negated character classes. For example, [^\d] can be written more concisely as \D.

Examples

Section titled “Examples”

Negated Digit Character Class

Section titled “Negated Digit Character Class”
AEconsB0patteAE< =sp ansty="le--0:#5CA7E4;--1:#3A68">81<1/sp ansty="le--0:#82AAFF;--1:#3B61">B<0[sp ansty="le--0:#7FDBCA;--1:#096E">7<2^sp ansty="le--0:#82AAFF;--1:#3B61">B0\1<1/sp ansty="le--0:#D6DEEB;--1:#403F">5<3;d ivclassNa="meco">
44AEco61B0pat446<88F spans="tyle--0:#D9F5DD;--1:#11">1<111/ spans="tyle--0:#82AAFF;--1:#3B">611<111/ spans="tyle--0:#D6DEEB;--1:#40">3<\D/>

Negated Word Character Class

Section titled “Negated Word Character Class”
AEconsB0patteAE< =sp ansty="le--0:#5CA7E4;--1:#3A68">81<1/sp ansty="le--0:#82AAFF;--1:#3B61">B<0[sp ansty="le--0:#7FDBCA;--1:#096E">7<2^sp ansty="le--0:#82AAFF;--1:#3B61">B0\7<2+sp ansty="le--0:#D9F5DD;--1:#1111">1<1/sp ansty="le--0:#D6DEEB;--1:#403F">5<3;d ivclassNa="meco">
44AEco61B0pat446<88F spans="tyle--0:#D9F5DD;--1:#11">1<111/ spans="tyle--0:#82AAFF;--1:#3B">6161<111/ spans="tyle--0:#D6DEEB;--1:#40">3

Negated Whitespace Character Class

Section titled “Negated Whitespace Character Class”
AEconsB0patteAE< =sp ansty="le--0:#5CA7E4;--1:#3A68">81<1/sp ansty="le--0:#82AAFF;--1:#3B61">B<0[sp ansty="le--0:#7FDBCA;--1:#096E">7<2^sp ansty="le--0:#82AAFF;--1:#3B61">B0\1<1/sp ansty="le--0:#D6DEEB;--1:#403F">5<3;d ivclassNa="meco">
44AEco61B0pat446<88F spans="tyle--0:#D9F5DD;--1:#11">1<111/ spans="tyle--0:#82AAFF;--1:#3B">611<111/ spans="tyle--0:#D6DEEB;--1:#40">3<\S/>

Negated Unicode Property Escape

Section titled “Negated Unicode Property Escape”
AEconsB0patteAE< =sp ansty="le--0:#5CA7E4;--1:#3A68">81<1/sp ansty="le--0:#82AAFF;--1:#3B61">B<0[sp ansty="le--0:#7FDBCA;--1:#096E">7<2^sp ansty="le--0:#F78C6C;--1:#AA09">82<\psp ansty="le--0:#82AAFF;--1:#3B61">B0{Letter<}]sp ansty="le--0:#D9F5DD;--1:#1111">1<1/sp ansty="le--0:#5CA7E4;--1:#3A68">85<3;d ivclassNa="meco">
44AEco61B0pat446<88F spans="tyle--0:#D9F5DD;--1:#11">1<111/ spans="tyle--0:#F78C6C;--1:#AA">09<82\P spans="tyle--0:#5CA7E4;--1:#3A">688F{Let1<111/ spans="tyle--0:#5CA7E4;--1:#3A">6<88Fu spans="tyle--0:#D6DEEB;--1:#40">3<}/u>

Options

Section titled “Options”

This rule is not configurable.

When Not To Use It

Section titled “When Not To Use It”

If you prefer the explicit negation syntax [^\d] for readability, or if your codebase has an established convention using negated character classes, you might prefer to disable this rule.

Further Reading

Section titled “Further Reading”

Equivalents in Other Linters

Section titled “Equivalents in Other Linters”