Canada postal code validation

Question

Hi,

I need to validate Canada postal code (for example:M4B 1C7) using C# regular expressions.

Please help.

Thanks.

Answer 1

I suggest the following:

bool FoundMatch = false;
try {
    FoundMatch = Regex.IsMatch(SubjectString, "\\A[ABCEGHJKLMNPRSTVXY]\\d[A-Z] ?\\d[A-Z]\\d\\z");
} catch (ArgumentException ex) {
    // Syntax error in the regular expression
}

Answer 2

Something like this:

^[A-Z]\d[A-Z] \d[A-Z]\d$

Answer 3

[ABCEFGHJKLMNPRSTVXY][0-9][ABCEFGHJKLMNPRSTVWXYZ][0-9][ABCEFGHJKLMNPRSTVWXYZ][0-9]

Canadian postal codes can't have certain letters. ( D, I, O, etc.) :D

source

EDIT: oh, and if you wanted a space in the middle you can use

[ABCEFGHJKLMNPRSTVXY][0-9][ABCEFGHJKLMNPRSTVWXYZ] [\s]  [0-9][ABCEFGHJKLMNPRSTVWXYZ][0-9]

\s will match any whitespace, newline and tab included. If you don't want those you could either use ^ to remove newlines and tabs or look up the ascii for the space character.

Answer 4

Validating the format of a postal code without validating its meaning isn't worth it, since typos can still result in a valid postal code for the wrong address. You want to validate the code against the address database. See http://www.canadapost.ca/cpo/mc/business/productsservices/atoz/postalcodeproducts.jsf