How to convert a String to an Int in Swift

There will be a time when you need to convert a string of integers ("123") back to an integer (123). It happens most of the time when you try to consume data from an external source like a website or API where you have no control over them.

There are many ways to convert a string of integers in Swift. Today, we will visit some of them.

Convert with Int

Int has an initializer that creates a new integer value from the given string.

init?(_ description: String)

To convert a string to integer, we initialize an Int with desired string.

let x = Int("123")
// 123

Before you go with these methods, you should know which kind of strings that Int can convert to integer.

Valid Strings

The possibilities are quite limited. It only supports strings that begin with a plus or minus sign character (+ or -), followed by one or more numeric digits (0-9).

Int("123")
// 123

Int("+123")
// 123

Int("-123")
// -123

Invalid Strings

Invalid strings are infinite. It is everything that is not valid, but I will give you some cases that you might encounter.

Int(" 100")                       // Includes whitespace
Int("21-50")                      // Invalid format
Int("ff6600")                     // Characters out of bounds
Int("10000000000000000000000000") // Out of range
Int("untitled123")                // Characters out of bounds
Int("123untitled")                // Characters out of bounds
Int("1,234")                      // Characters out of bounds

Since the initializer is failable initialzier, all of the above would produce nil as a result.

You might want to assign a default value or wrap it in if-let to ensure the presence of value.

let x = Int(" 100") ?? 0

if let x = Int(" 100") {

}

You can mitigate the problem in some cases, like a string with whitespace, by clean it up before the conversion.

In the following example, we trimming out whitesapces character from a string before we do a conversion.

Int(" 123 ".trimmingCharacters(in: .whitespacesAndNewlines))
//123

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Convert with NumberFormatter

As you can see, the integer initializer is quite simple. You can only convert only from a string that exactly represent an integer. But if you have a string that represents curtain format of integer, you should use NumberFormatter.

To use it, we initialize NumberFormatter, then passing a string to the number(from:) method, which will return NSNumber?. Then we call intValue on NSNumber instance to get back an integer.

func number(from string: String) -> NSNumber?

Here is an exmaple how we convert a string to integer with NumberFormatter.

let nf = NumberFormatter()
let x = nf.number(from: "123")?.intValue
/// 123

Valid Strings

NumberFormatter is far more sophisticated than the former solution. It supports a wide range of number formatted strings based on locale-appropriate group or decimal separators, which you can set.

The only shared valid characteristic regardless of number format is whitespace insensitive. Any leading or trailing space separator characters in a string are ignored. For example, the strings “ 123”, “123 ”, and “ 123 ” all produce the number 123.

let nf = NumberFormatter()

nf.number(from: " 123")?.intValue
/// 123

nf.number(from: "123 ")?.intValue
/// 123

nf.number(from: " 123 ")?.intValue
/// 123

Invalid Strings

Apart from this whitespace rule, everything is depending on NumberFormatter properties and numberStyle. I will give you one example here. If you know that your string will be a decimal format integer, you can create NumberFormatter like this to do the parsing.

let nf = NumberFormatter()
nf.numberStyle = .decimal
let x = nf.number(from: "1,234")?.intValue
// 1234

We set numberStyle to .decimal format, which will take decimal separators and thousand separators into consideration.

If you change numberStyle, the above string would no longer valid and produce nil.

let nf = NumberFormatter()
nf.numberStyle = .none
let x = nf.number(from: "1,234")?.intValue
// nil

There are more styles and properties that you can override to suit your need. Here are some style examples.

Conclusion

We learn different ways to do a string to integer conversion. It is up to you to choose the right tool for your string. Integer initializer is suited for something quick and simple, while NumberFormatter will help you for an integer with formatted style.

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Related Resources

• The swift programming language - Failable Initializers
• Apple Documentation
  • Int
  • NumberFormatter