@array1 = ("fg", "dg", "tu","ph", "dgs",); @array2 = ("dgs","sfd","dg","ph","rhd"); if (scalar(@array1) >= scalar(@array2)) { @bigger_array = @array1; @smaller_array = @array2; } else { @bigger_array = @array2; @smaller_array = @array1; } $value = 0; foreach $word (@bigger_array) { for (my $i = 0; $i <= scalar(@smaller_array); $i++) { if($word eq $array1[$i]) { splice(@smaller_array,$i, 1); $i--; $value++; } } } print $value;