Using JSON

The json extension, included by default in PHP installations, natively supports converting data to JSON format from PHP variables and vice versa.

To get a JSON representation of a PHP variable, use json_encode():

$data = array(1, 2, "three"); $jsonData = json_encode($data); echo $jsonData; [1, 2, "three"]

Similarly, if you have a string containing JSON data, you can turn it into a PHP variable using json_decode():

$jsonData = "[1, 2, [3, 4], \"five\"]"; $data = json_decode($jsonData); print_r($data); Array( [0] => 1 [1] => 2 [2] => Array( [0] => 3 [1] => 4 ) [3] => five)

If the string is invalid JSON, or if the string is not encoded in UTF-8 format, a single NULL value is returned instead.

The value types in JSON are converted to PHP equivalents as follows:

object

An associative array containing the object’s key-value pairs. Each ...