Java: Count all words in a string

Last update on March 11 2025 11:08:36 (UTC/GMT +8 hours)

Count Words in String

Write a Java method to count all the words in a string.

Test Data:
Input the string: The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.

Pictorial Presentation:

Sample Solution:

Java Code:

import java.util.Scanner;
public class Exercise5 {

  public static void main(String[] args)
    {
        Scanner in = new Scanner(System.in);
        System.out.print("Input the string: ");
        String str = in.nextLine();

        System.out.print("Number of words in the string: " + count_Words(str)+"\n");
    }

 public static int count_Words(String str)
    {
       int count = 0;
        if (!(" ".equals(str.substring(0, 1))) || !(" ".equals(str.substring(str.length() - 1))))
        {
            for (int i = 0; i < str.length(); i++)
            {
                if (str.charAt(i) == ' ')
                {
                    count++;
                }
            }
            count = count + 1; 
        }
        return count; // returns 0 if string starts or ends with space " ".
    }
 }

Sample Output:

Input the string: The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog                                                  
Number of words in the string: 9 

Flowchart:

For more Practice: Solve these Related Problems:

• Write a Java program to count the number of words in a string without using the split() method.
• Write a Java program to count words in a string by treating punctuation marks as additional delimiters.
• Write a Java program to trim extra spaces from a string and then count the number of words.
• Write a Java program to count words in a string and then output the longest word found.

Java Code Editor:

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