Java String Manipulation

Techniques

November 23, 2025

 Java String Manipulation Techniques

Contents

1 Introduction 3

2 String Comparison Methods in Java 3

2.1 Content Equality with equals() and Case-Insensitive

Comparison with equalsIgnoreCase() . . . . . . . . . . 3

3 String Concatenation Techniques 5

3.1 Concatenation Using + Operator and concat() . . . . . . 5

4 Demonstrating String Immutability 6

4.1 Example Illustrating Immutability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

5 Replacing Vowels with Asterisk 7

5.1 Implementation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

6 Extracting Substrings Using substring() 8

6.1 Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

7 Searching for a Word in a Sentence 9

7.1 Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

8 Using StringBuffer for Mutable Strings 10

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8.1 Code Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

9 Difference Between StringBuffer and StringBuilder 11

9.1 Demonstration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

10 Using toString() Method in Classes 12

10.1 Sample Class and Usage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

11 Tokenizing a Sentence Using StringTokenizer 13

11.1 Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

12 Word Frequency in a Paragraph 14

12.1 Implementation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

13 Cleaning and Formatting Strings 16

13.1 Code Sample . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

14 Finding Common Substrings Using a Loop 17

14.1 Implementation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

15 Demonstrating Mutability with String and StringBuffer 19

15.1 Complete Code . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

16 Uppercase Conversion and Palindrome Check 20

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 Java String Manipulation Techniques

16.1 Code with Explanation and Output . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

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 Java String Manipulation Techniques

1 Introduction

Java strings are fundamental data types used extensively for text
processing. Understanding how to manipulate strings efficiently is
crucial for any Java programmer. This document systematically ex-
plores a series of Java string operations, ranging from basic compar-
isons and concatenations to advanced topics such as immutability,
mutability, tokenization, substring search, and palindrome checking.
Each section presents a clear explanation, accompanied by sample
code and expected outputs, to provide a comprehensive understand-
ing of these concepts.

2 String Comparison Methods in Java

Comparing strings accurately is a common requirement. Java

provides several methods with different behaviors concerning con-
tent equality and case sensitivity.

2.1 Content Equality with equals() and Case-Insensitive

Comparison with equalsIgnoreCase()

The equals() method compares two strings exactly, including

case. The equalsIgnoreCase() method ignores case differences.

// Example of string comparison

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import [Link];

public class StringComparison {

public static void main(String[] args) {
Scanner sc = new Scanner([Link]);
[Link](”Enter first string: ”);
String s1 = [Link]();
[Link](”Enter second string: ”);
String s2 = [Link]();

if ([Link](s2)) {
[Link](”Strings are exactly equal.”);
} else if ([Link](s2)) {
[Link](”Strings are equal ignoring case.”);
} else {
[Link](”Strings are different.”);
}
[Link]();
}
}

Output example:

Enter first string: Hello

Enter second string: hello
Strings are equal ignoring case.

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3 String Concatenation Techniques

Java offers multiple ways to concatenate strings, with the most

common being the + operator and the concat() method.

3.1 Concatenation Using + Operator and concat()

// Concatenation example
public class StringConcat {
public static void main(String[] args) {
String s1 = ”Java”;
String s2 = ”Programming”;

String result1 = s1 + ” ” + s2;

String result2 = [Link](” ”).concat(s2);

[Link](”Using + operator: ” + result1);

[Link](”Using concat(): ” + result2);
}
}

Output:

Using + operator: Java Programming

Using concat(): Java Programming

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4 Demonstrating String Immutability

Strings in Java are immutable, meaning any modification results

in a new string object.

4.1 Example Illustrating Immutability

// Demonstrate string immutability

public class StringImmutability {
public static void main(String[] args) {
String original = ”Immutable”;
String modified = [Link](’I’, ’i’);

[Link](”Original string: ” + original);

[Link](”Modified string: ” + modified);
}
}

Explanation: The replace() method does not change the orig-

inal string but returns a new modified string.

Output:

Original string: Immutable

Modified string: immutable

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5 Replacing Vowels with Asterisk

This program replaces all vowels in a string with * using Java

String methods and regular expressions.

5.1 Implementation

// Replace vowels with ’*’

import [Link];

public class ReplaceVowels {

public static void main(String[] args) {
Scanner sc = new Scanner([Link]);
[Link](”Enter a string: ”);
String input = [Link]();

String replaced = [Link](”(?i)[aeiou]”, ”*”);

[Link](”After replacement: ” + replaced);
[Link]();
}
}

Output example:

Enter a string: Education

After replacement: *d*c*t**n

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6 Extracting Substrings Using substring()

Java’s substring() method extracts parts of a string by specify-

ing start and end indices.

6.1 Example

// Substring extraction
public class SubstringExample {
public static void main(String[] args) {
String text = ”JavaProgramming”;
String sub1 = [Link](0, 4); // ”Java”
String sub2 = [Link](4); // ”Programming”

[Link](”First part: ” + sub1);

[Link](”Second part: ” + sub2);
}
}

Output:

First part: Java

Second part: Programming

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7 Searching for a Word in a Sentence

Using indexOf() and contains(), you can locate a word within

a sentence.

7.1 Program

// Search word position

import [Link];

public class WordSearch {

public static void main(String[] args) {
Scanner sc = new Scanner([Link]);
[Link](”Enter a sentence: ”);
String sentence = [Link]();
[Link](”Enter word to search: ”);
String word = [Link]();

if ([Link](word)) {
int position = [Link](word);
[Link](”Word found at position: ” + position)
} else {
[Link](”Word not found.”);
}
[Link]();
}
}

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Output example:

Enter a sentence: The quick brown fox

Enter word to search: brown
Word found at position: 10

8 Using StringBuffer for Mutable Strings

StringBuffer allows modification after creation, supporting op-

erations such as append, insert, and reverse.

8.1 Code Example

// StringBuffer operations
public class StringBufferDemo {
public static void main(String[] args) {
StringBuffer sb = new StringBuffer(”Hello”);
[Link](” World”);
[Link](6, ”Java ”);
[Link]();

[Link](”Modified string: ” + [Link]());

}
}

Output:

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Modified string: dlroW avaJ olleH

9 Difference Between StringBuffer and StringBuilder

Both classes provide mutable strings, but StringBuffer is syn-

chronized (thread-safe), while StringBuilder is not, making the lat-
ter faster in single-thread scenarios.

9.1 Demonstration

// Compare StringBuffer and StringBuilder

public class BufferBuilderDifference {
public static void main(String[] args) {
StringBuffer sbuf = new StringBuffer(”Buffer”);
StringBuilder sbld = new StringBuilder(”Builder”);

[Link](” Class”);
[Link](” Class”);

[Link](”StringBuffer: ” + sbuf);
[Link](”StringBuilder: ” + sbld);
}
}

Output:

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StringBuffer: Buffer Class

StringBuilder: Builder Class

10 Using toString() Method in Classes

Overriding toString() in a class allows convenient string rep-

resentation of object data.

10.1 Sample Class and Usage

// toString() example
class Person {
String name;
int age;

Person(String n, int a) {
name = n;
age = a;
}

@Override
public String toString() {
return ”Person[name=” + name + ”, age=” + age + ”]”;
}
}

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public class ToStringDemo {

public static void main(String[] args) {
Person p = new Person(”Alice”, 30);
[Link]([Link]());
}
}

Output:

Person[name=Alice, age=30]

11 Tokenizing a Sentence Using StringTokenizer

The StringTokenizer class can split a sentence into tokens (words)

and count them.

11.1 Example

// Tokenize and count words

import [Link];
import [Link];

public class TokenCount {

public static void main(String[] args) {

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 Java String Manipulation Techniques

Scanner sc = new Scanner([Link]);

[Link](”Enter a sentence: ”);
String sentence = [Link]();

StringTokenizer tokenizer = new StringTokenizer(sentence);

int count = [Link]();
[Link](”Number of words: ” + count);
[Link]();
}
}

Output example:

Enter a sentence: Java programming language

Number of words: 3

12 Word Frequency in a Paragraph

This program counts occurrences of a specific word in a para-

graph using string methods.

12.1 Implementation

// Word frequency count

import [Link];

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public class WordFrequency {

public static void main(String[] args) {
Scanner sc = new Scanner([Link]);
[Link](”Enter a paragraph:”);
String paragraph = [Link]();
[Link](”Enter word to count: ”);
String word = [Link]();

String lowerPara = [Link]();

String lowerWord = [Link]();

int frequency = 0;
int index = 0;

while ((index = [Link](lowerWord, index)) != -1) {

frequency++;
index += [Link]();
}

[Link](”Frequency of \”” + word + ”\”: ” + freque

[Link]();
}
}

Output example:

Enter a paragraph:

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Java is a popular programming language. Java is platform-independent.

Enter word to count: Java
Frequency of ”Java”: 2

13 Cleaning and Formatting Strings

Using replace() and toLowerCase() methods, user inputs can

be cleaned and normalized.

13.1 Code Sample

// Clean and format string

import [Link];

public class CleanFormat {

public static void main(String[] args) {
Scanner sc = new Scanner([Link]);
[Link](”Enter input string: ”);
String input = [Link]();

String cleaned = [Link](”,”, ””).replace(”.”, ””).toLo

[Link](”Cleaned string: ” + cleaned);
[Link]();
}
}

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Output example:

Enter input string: Hello, World.

Cleaned string: hello world

14 Finding Common Substrings Using a Loop

This program compares two strings and displays all common sub-
strings.

14.1 Implementation

// Find common substrings

import [Link];
import [Link];

public class CommonSubstrings {

public static void main(String[] args) {
Scanner sc = new Scanner([Link]);
[Link](”Enter first string: ”);
String s1 = [Link]();
[Link](”Enter second string: ”);
String s2 = [Link]();

HashSet<String> common = new HashSet<>();

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for (int len = 1; len <= [Link]([Link](), [Link]());

for (int i = 0; i <= [Link]() - len; i++) {
String substr = [Link](i, i + len);
if ([Link](substr)) {
[Link](substr);
}
}
}

[Link](”Common substrings:”);
for (String str : common) {
[Link](str);
}
[Link]();
}
}

Explanation: The program finds all substrings of all lengths present

in both strings, displaying unique matches.

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15 Demonstrating Mutability with String and

StringBuffer

A class example shows real-time mutability differences between

String (immutable) and StringBuffer (mutable).

15.1 Complete Code

// Mutability demonstration
public class MutabilityDemo {
String immutableString = ”Hello”;
StringBuffer mutableString = new StringBuffer(”Hello”);

public void modify() {

[Link](” World”); // Does not change immutab
[Link](” World”); // Modifies mutableString
}

public void display() {

[Link](”Immutable String: ” + immutableString);
[Link](”Mutable StringBuffer: ” + mutableString);
}

public static void main(String[] args) {

MutabilityDemo demo = new MutabilityDemo();
[Link]();

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[Link]();
}
}

Output:

Immutable String: Hello

Mutable StringBuffer: Hello World

16 Uppercase Conversion and Palindrome Check

This Java application reads a string, converts it to uppercase, and

checks if it is a palindrome using string methods.

16.1 Code with Explanation and Output

// Palindrome checking program

import [Link];

public class PalindromeCheck {

public static void main(String[] args) {
Scanner sc = new Scanner([Link]);
[Link](”Enter a string: ”);
String input = [Link]();

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// Convert to uppercase for uniform comparison

String upperInput = [Link]();

// Remove non-alphanumeric characters for accurate palindrome

String cleaned = [Link](”[^A-Z0-9]”, ””);

// Reverse the cleaned string

String reversed = new StringBuilder(cleaned).reverse().toStri

[Link](”Uppercase input: ” + upperInput);

if ([Link](reversed)) {
[Link](”The string is a palindrome.”);
} else {
[Link](”The string is not a palindrome.”);
}

[Link]();
}
}

Explanation: Converting the input to uppercase normalizes case

differences. Cleaning removes spaces and punctuation for a proper
palindrome check. The reversed string is compared to the cleaned
original to determine palindrome status.

Output example:

Enter a string: Madam, in Eden, I’m Adam

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Uppercase input: MADAM, IN EDEN, I’M ADAM

The string is a palindrome.

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References

• Oracle Java Documentation: [Link]

8/docs/api/java/lang/[Link]

• GeeksforGeeks Java String Tutorials: [Link]

org/java-string-methods/

• Oracle StringBuffer API: [Link]

8/docs/api/java/lang/[Link]

• Oracle StringTokenizer API: [Link]

8/docs/api/java/util/[Link]

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