Unicode-Digits So, you have matched a string with "\d" and now want to do some math. What is that you say? The number your captured plus 5 is 5? Oh, that is right \d now matches UNICODE digits not [0−9]. What to do? Well, You can just call "digits_to_int" and all of your troubles* are over! use Unicode::Digits qw/digits_to_int/; my $string = "forty−two in Mongolian is \x{1814}\x{1812}"; my $num = digits_to_int $string =~ /(\d+)/; print $num + 5, "\n"; INSTALLATION To install this module, run the following commands: perl Build.PL ./Build ./Build test ./Build install SUPPORT AND DOCUMENTATION After installing, you can find documentation for this module with the perldoc command. perldoc Unicode::Digits COPYRIGHT AND LICENCE Copyright (C) 2009 Chas. J. Owens IV This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.