---
title: "hasPrefix(_:)"
framework: swift
role: symbol
role_heading: Instance Method
path: "swift/substring/hasprefix(_:)"
---

# hasPrefix(_:)

Returns a Boolean value indicating whether the string begins with the specified prefix.

## Declaration

```swift
func hasPrefix<Prefix>(_ prefix: Prefix) -> Bool where Prefix : StringProtocol
```

## Parameters

- `prefix`: A possible prefix to test against this string.

## Return Value

Return Value true if the string begins with prefix; otherwise, false.

## Discussion

Discussion The comparison is both case sensitive and Unicode safe. The case-sensitive comparison will only match strings whose corresponding characters have the same case. let cafe = "Café du Monde"

// Case sensitive print(cafe.hasPrefix("café")) // Prints "false" The Unicode-safe comparison matches Unicode extended grapheme clusters rather than the code points used to compose them. The example below uses two strings with different forms of the "é" character—the first uses the composed form and the second uses the decomposed form. // Unicode safe let composedCafe = "Café" let decomposedCafe = "Cafe\u{0301}"

print(cafe.hasPrefix(composedCafe)) // Prints "true" print(cafe.hasPrefix(decomposedCafe)) // Prints "true"