PHP nl2br() Function
Topic: PHP String ReferencePrev|Next
Description
The nl2br() function inserts HTML line breaks before all newlines (\r\n, \n\r, \n and \r) in a string.
The following table summarizes the technical details of this function.
| Return Value: | Returns the modified string. |
|---|---|
| Version: | PHP 4+ |
Syntax
The basic syntax of the nl2br() function is given with:
The following example shows the nl2br() function in action.
Example
Run this code »<?php
echo nl2br("Hi, there!\nWelcome to our website.");
?>The output of the above example will be (view source to get an idea):
Welcome to our website.
However in the browser you will see something like this:
Welcome to our website.
Parameters
The nl2br() function accepts the following parameters.
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| string | Required. Specifies the string to work on. |
| is_xhtml |
Optional. Specifies whether to use XHTML compatible line breaks or not. Possible values are:
|
More Examples
Here're some more examples showing how nl2br() function actually works:
The following example inserts HTML <br> tag before newlines using is_xhtml parameter.
Example
Run this code »<?php
echo nl2br("Hi, there!\r\nWelcome to our website.", false);
?>The output of the above example will be (view source to get an idea):
Welcome to our website.
However in the browser you will see something like this:
Welcome to our website.
Tip: The character \r is a carrige return and \n is a line feed. The character \n is used to create a newline in UNIX, whereas \r is used in old MacOS, while in Windows the two character sequence: \r\n is used. To be on safe side use the sequence \r\n instead.
