use strict; my @keywords=qw/foo bar 12345 abcd/; my $string = "foobarfoo1234523423412345abcdefsadfabc"; my %result; foreach my $k (@keywords){ my @matches = ($string =~ /$k/ig ); $result{$k} = scalar(@matches); } foreach my $s (keys %result){ print "$s=>$result{$s}\n"; } __END__ bar=>1 12345=>2 foo=>2 abcd=>1