Regex to find whole words

Solution 1:

.*\bEU\b.*

 public static void main(String[] args) {
       String regex = ".*\\bEU\\b.*";
       String text = "EU is an acronym for  EUROPE";
       //String text = "EULA should not match";


       if(text.matches(regex)) {
           System.out.println("It matches");
       } else {
           System.out.println("Doesn't match");
       }

    }

Solution 2:

You could do something like

String str = "I am in the EU.";
Matcher matcher = Pattern.compile("\\bEU\\b").matcher(str);
if (matcher.find()) {
   System.out.println("Found word EU");
}

Solution 3:

Use a pattern with word boundaries:

String str = "I am in the EU.";

if (str.matches(".*\\bEU\\b.*"))
    doSomething();

Take a look at the docs for Pattern.