Fastest way to check if string contains only digits

Question

bool IsDigitsOnly(string str)
{
    foreach (char c in str)
    {
        if (c < '0' || c > '9')
            return false;
    }

    return true;
}

Will probably be the fastest way to do it.

You could simply do this using LINQ

return str.All(char.IsDigit);

1. .All returns true for empty strings and exception for null strings.
2. char.IsDigit is true for all Unicode characters.

Here's some benchmarks based on 1000000 parses of the same string:

Updated for release stats:

IsDigitsOnly: 384588
TryParse:     639583
Regex:        1329571

Here's the code, looks like IsDigitsOnly is faster:

class Program
{
    private static Regex regex = new Regex("^[0-9]+$", RegexOptions.Compiled);

    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        Stopwatch watch = new Stopwatch();
        string test = int.MaxValue.ToString();
        int value;

        watch.Start();
        for(int i=0; i< 1000000; i++)
        {
            int.TryParse(test, out value);
        }
        watch.Stop();
        Console.WriteLine("TryParse: "+watch.ElapsedTicks);

        watch.Reset();
        watch.Start();
        for (int i = 0; i < 1000000; i++)
        {
            IsDigitsOnly(test);
        }
        watch.Stop();
        Console.WriteLine("IsDigitsOnly: " + watch.ElapsedTicks);

        watch.Reset();
        watch.Start();
        for (int i = 0; i < 1000000; i++)
        {
            regex.IsMatch(test);
        }
        watch.Stop();
        Console.WriteLine("Regex: " + watch.ElapsedTicks);

        Console.ReadLine();
    }

    static bool IsDigitsOnly(string str)
    {
        foreach (char c in str)
        {
            if (c < '0' || c > '9')
                return false;
        }

        return true;
    }
}

Of course it's worth noting that TryParse does allow leading/trailing whitespace as well as culture specific symbols. It's also limited on length of string.

The char already has an IsDigit(char c) which does this:

 public static bool IsDigit(char c)
    {
      if (!char.IsLatin1(c))
        return CharUnicodeInfo.GetUnicodeCategory(c) == UnicodeCategory.DecimalDigitNumber;
      if ((int) c >= 48)
        return (int) c <= 57;
      else
        return false;
    }

You can simply do this:

var theString = "839278";
bool digitsOnly = theString.All(char.IsDigit);

Can be about 20% faster by using just one comparison per char and for instead of foreach:

bool isDigits(string s) 
{ 
    if (s == null || s == "") return false; 

    for (int i = 0; i < s.Length; i++) 
        if ((s[i] ^ '0') > 9) 
            return false; 

    return true; 
}

---

Code used for testing (always profile because the results depend on hardware, versions, order, etc.):

static bool isDigitsFr(string s) { if (s == null || s == "") return false; for (int i = 0; i < s.Length; i++) if (s[i] < '0' || s[i] > '9') return false; return true; }
static bool isDigitsFu(string s) { if (s == null || s == "") return false; for (int i = 0; i < s.Length; i++) if ((uint)(s[i] - '0') > 9) return false; return true; }
static bool isDigitsFx(string s) { if (s == null || s == "") return false; for (int i = 0; i < s.Length; i++) if ((s[i] ^ '0') > 9) return false; return true; }
static bool isDigitsEr(string s) { if (s == null || s == "") return false; foreach (char c in s) if (c < '0' || c > '9') return false; return true; }
static bool isDigitsEu(string s) { if (s == null || s == "") return false; foreach (char c in s) if ((uint)(c - '0') > 9) return false; return true; }
static bool isDigitsEx(string s) { if (s == null || s == "") return false; foreach (char c in s) if ((c ^ '0') > 9) return false; return true; }
static void test()
{
    var w = new Stopwatch(); bool b; var s = int.MaxValue + ""; int r = 12345678*2; var ss = new SortedSet<string>(); //s = string.Concat(Enumerable.Range(0, 127).Select(i => ((char)i ^ '0') < 10 ? 1 : 0));
    w.Restart(); for (int i = 0; i < r; i++) b = s.All(char.IsDigit); w.Stop(); ss.Add(w.Elapsed + ".All .IsDigit"); 
    w.Restart(); for (int i = 0; i < r; i++) b = s.All(c => c >= '0' && c <= '9'); w.Stop(); ss.Add(w.Elapsed + ".All <>"); 
    w.Restart(); for (int i = 0; i < r; i++) b = s.All(c => (c ^ '0') < 10); w.Stop(); ss.Add(w.Elapsed + " .All ^"); 
    w.Restart(); for (int i = 0; i < r; i++) b = isDigitsFr(s); w.Stop(); ss.Add(w.Elapsed + " for     <>");
    w.Restart(); for (int i = 0; i < r; i++) b = isDigitsFu(s); w.Stop(); ss.Add(w.Elapsed + " for     -");
    w.Restart(); for (int i = 0; i < r; i++) b = isDigitsFx(s); w.Stop(); ss.Add(w.Elapsed + " for     ^");
    w.Restart(); for (int i = 0; i < r; i++) b = isDigitsEr(s); w.Stop(); ss.Add(w.Elapsed + " foreach <>");
    w.Restart(); for (int i = 0; i < r; i++) b = isDigitsEu(s); w.Stop(); ss.Add(w.Elapsed + " foreach -");
    w.Restart(); for (int i = 0; i < r; i++) b = isDigitsEx(s); w.Stop(); ss.Add(w.Elapsed + " foreach ^");
    MessageBox.Show(string.Join("\n", ss)); return;
}

Results on Intel i5-3470 @ 3.2GHz, VS 2015 .NET 4.6.1 Release mode and optimizations enabled:

time    method          ratio
0.7776  for     ^       1.0000 
0.7984  foreach -       1.0268 
0.8066  foreach ^       1.0372 
0.8940  for     -       1.1497 
0.8976  for     <>      1.1543 
0.9456  foreach <>      1.2160 
4.4559  .All <>         5.7303 
4.7791  .All ^          6.1458 
4.8539  .All. IsDigit   6.2421 

---

For anyone tempted to use the shorter methods, note that

• .All results in true for empty strings and exception for null strings
• char.IsDigit is true for all Unicode characters in the Nd category
• int.TryParse also allows white spase and sign characters

If you are concerned about performance, use neither int.TryParse nor Regex - write your own (simple) function (DigitsOnly or DigitsOnly2 below, but not DigitsOnly3 - LINQ seems to incur a significant overhead).

Also, be aware that int.TryParse will fail if the string is too long to "fit" into int.

This simple benchmark...

class Program {

    static bool DigitsOnly(string s) {
        int len = s.Length;
        for (int i = 0; i < len; ++i) {
            char c = s[i];
            if (c < '0' || c > '9')
                return false;
        }
        return true;
    }

    static bool DigitsOnly2(string s) {
        foreach (char c in s) {
            if (c < '0' || c > '9')
                return false;
        }
        return true;
    }

    static bool DigitsOnly3(string s) {
        return s.All(c => c >= '0' && c <= '9');
    }

    static void Main(string[] args) {

        const string s1 = "916734184";
        const string s2 = "916734a84";

        const int iterations = 1000000;
        var sw = new Stopwatch();

        sw.Restart();
        for (int i = 0 ; i < iterations; ++i) {
            bool success = DigitsOnly(s1);
            bool failure = DigitsOnly(s2);
        }
        sw.Stop();
        Console.WriteLine(string.Format("DigitsOnly: {0}", sw.Elapsed));

        sw.Restart();
        for (int i = 0; i < iterations; ++i) {
            bool success = DigitsOnly2(s1);
            bool failure = DigitsOnly2(s2);
        }
        sw.Stop();
        Console.WriteLine(string.Format("DigitsOnly2: {0}", sw.Elapsed));

        sw.Restart();
        for (int i = 0; i < iterations; ++i) {
            bool success = DigitsOnly3(s1);
            bool failure = DigitsOnly3(s2);
        }
        sw.Stop();
        Console.WriteLine(string.Format("DigitsOnly3: {0}", sw.Elapsed));

        sw.Restart();
        for (int i = 0; i < iterations; ++i) {
            int dummy;
            bool success = int.TryParse(s1, out dummy);
            bool failure = int.TryParse(s2, out dummy);
        }
        sw.Stop();
        Console.WriteLine(string.Format("int.TryParse: {0}", sw.Elapsed));

        sw.Restart();
        var regex = new Regex("^[0-9]+$", RegexOptions.Compiled);
        for (int i = 0; i < iterations; ++i) {
            bool success = regex.IsMatch(s1);
            bool failure = regex.IsMatch(s2);
        }
        sw.Stop();
        Console.WriteLine(string.Format("Regex.IsMatch: {0}", sw.Elapsed));

    }

}

...produces the following result...

DigitsOnly: 00:00:00.0346094
DigitsOnly2: 00:00:00.0365220
DigitsOnly3: 00:00:00.2669425
int.TryParse: 00:00:00.3405548
Regex.IsMatch: 00:00:00.7017648

Function with empty validation:

public static bool IsDigitsOnly(string str)
  {             
        return !string.IsNullOrEmpty(str) && str.All(char.IsDigit);
  }