Split a string only by first space in python

Question

I have string for example: "238 NEO Sports". I want to split this string only at the first space. The output should be ["238","NEO Sports"].

One way I could think of is by using split() and finally merging the last two strings returned. Is there a better way?

Possible duplicate of [Splitting on first occurrence](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/6903557/splitting-on-first-occurrence) — shad0w_wa1k3r, Aug 21 '19 at 21:03

Avinash Raj · Accepted Answer · 2018-10-08T03:29:36.037

155

Just pass the count as second parameter to str.split function.

>>> s = "238 NEO Sports"
>>> s.split(" ", 1)
['238', 'NEO Sports']

edited Oct 08 '18 at 03:29

answered Jun 04 '15 at 06:14

Avinash Raj

wim · Answer 2 · 2020-03-21T17:51:59.277

37

>>> "238 NEO Sports".split(None, 1)
['238', 'NEO Sports']

edited Mar 21 '20 at 17:51

answered Jun 04 '15 at 06:14

wim

11

This is the only answer which works with any whitespace such as tabs. +1 – PolyMesh Nov 16 '17 at 00:46
I think it is really a bad style to supply an argument set to its default value just to move to the next argument which is directly accessible as a keyword argument. Much better answer by Shubham Gupta: `"238 NEO Sports".split(maxsplit=1)` – pabouk - Ukraine stay strong May 17 '22 at 14:36
1

@pabouk Normally I'd agree, but the downside of that is it only works on Python 3.3+. If you want to write a cross-compatible code which works on Python 2 + Python 3 the same way, you have to do it like this. Do note the answer is from 7 years ago.. – wim May 17 '22 at 16:50

score 3 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 26 '21 at 14:28

3

**Use in-built terminology, as it will helpful to remember for future reference. When in doubt always prefer string.split(shift+tab)

string.split(maxsplit = 1)

answered Dec 26 '21 at 14:28

Shubham Gupta

score 2 · Answer 4 · answered Jun 04 '15 at 06:47

2

Use string.split()

string = "238 NEO Sports"
print string.split(' ', 1)

Output:

['238', 'NEO Sports']

answered Jun 04 '15 at 06:47

Haresh Shyara

4 Answers4