A Matches collection contains individual Match objects, and can be only created using the Execute method of the RegExp object. The Matches collection's one property is read-only, as are the individual Match object properties.

When a regular expression is executed, zero or more Match objects can result. Each Match object provides access to the string found by the regular expression, the length of the string, and an index to where the match was found.

The following code illustrates how to obtain a Matches collection from a regular expression search and how to iterate the collection:

Function RegExpTest(patrn, strng)
  Dim regEx, Match, Matches		' Create variable.
  Set regEx = New RegExp			' Create regular expression.
  regEx.Pattern = patrn			' Set pattern.
  regEx.IgnoreCase = True			' Set case insensitivity.
  regEx.Global = True			' Set global applicability.
  Set Matches = regEx.Execute(strng)	' Execute search.
  For Each Match in Matches		' Iterate Matches collection.
    RetStr = RetStr & "Match found at position "
    RetStr = RetStr & Match.FirstIndex & ". Match Value is '"
    RetStr = RetStr & Match.Value & "'." & vbCRLF
  Next
  RegExpTest = RetStr
End Function

MsgBox(RegExpTest("is.", "IS1 is2 IS3 is4"))