stringdist_join: Join two tables based on fuzzy string matching of their...

In fuzzyjoin: Join Tables Together on Inexact Matching

Join two tables based on fuzzy string matching of their columns

Description

Join two tables based on fuzzy string matching of their columns. This is useful, for example, in matching free-form inputs in a survey or online form, where it can catch misspellings and small personal changes.

Usage

stringdist_join(
  x,
  y,
  by = NULL,
  max_dist = 2,
  method = c("osa", "lv", "dl", "hamming", "lcs", "qgram", "cosine", "jaccard", "jw",
    "soundex"),
  mode = "inner",
  ignore_case = FALSE,
  distance_col = NULL,
  ...
)

stringdist_inner_join(x, y, by = NULL, distance_col = NULL, ...)

stringdist_left_join(x, y, by = NULL, distance_col = NULL, ...)

stringdist_right_join(x, y, by = NULL, distance_col = NULL, ...)

stringdist_full_join(x, y, by = NULL, distance_col = NULL, ...)

stringdist_semi_join(x, y, by = NULL, distance_col = NULL, ...)

stringdist_anti_join(x, y, by = NULL, distance_col = NULL, ...)

Arguments

x	A tbl
y	A tbl
by	Columns by which to join the two tables
max_dist	Maximum distance to use for joining
method	Method for computing string distance, see stringdist-metrics in the stringdist package.
mode	One of "inner", "left", "right", "full" "semi", or "anti"
ignore_case	Whether to be case insensitive (default yes)
distance_col	If given, will add a column with this name containing the difference between the two
...	Arguments passed on to stringdist

Details

If method = "soundex", the max_dist is automatically set to 0.5, since soundex returns either a 0 (match) or a 1 (no match).

Examples

library(dplyr)
library(ggplot2)
data(diamonds)

d <- data_frame(approximate_name = c("Idea", "Premiums", "Premioom",
                                     "VeryGood", "VeryGood", "Faiir"),
                type = 1:6)

# no matches when they are inner-joined:
diamonds %>%
  inner_join(d, by = c(cut = "approximate_name"))

# but we can match when they're fuzzy joined
diamonds %>%
 stringdist_inner_join(d, by = c(cut = "approximate_name"))

fuzzyjoin documentation built on Aug. 8, 2025, 7:09 p.m.