How to Split String by Delimiter/Separator in PHP?

Given a String, the task is to split the string by the delimiter. In this case, the delimiter is comma “,”.

Examples:

Input: apple,orange,banana
Output:
    apple
    orange
    banana

There are seven approaches to split the string, these are:

Split String by Delimiter using explode() Function

The explode() function splits a string into an array based on a specified delimiter (in this case, a comma).

PHP

<?php

$string = "apple,orange,banana";

// Split the string into an array
// using the comma as a delimiter
$fruitsArray = explode(',', $string);

// Output each element of the
// resulting array
foreach ($fruitsArray as $fruit) {
    echo $fruit . "\n";
}

?>

Output

apple
orange
banana

Split String by Delimiter using preg_split() Function and Regular Expression

The preg_split() function with a regular expression to split the string into an array, providing more flexibility for complex delimiter patterns.

PHP

<?php

$string = "apple,orange,banana";

// Split the string into an array using
// a regular expression to match commas
$fruitsArray = preg_split('/,/', $string);

// Output each element of the resulting array
foreach ($fruitsArray as $fruit) {
    echo $fruit . "\n";
}

?>

Output

apple
orange
banana

Split String by Delimiter using strtok() Function

The strtok() function to tokenize the string based on a specified delimiter (comma in this case) iteratively until no more tokens are found.

PHP

<?php

$string = "apple,orange,banana";

// Use strtok to tokenize the
// string based on commas
$token = strtok($string, ',');

// Output each token until there
// are no more
while ($token !== false) {
    echo $token . "\n";
    $token = strtok(',');
}

?>

Output

apple
orange
banana

Split String by Delimiter using sscanf() Function

Utilizes the sscanf() function with a format specifier to extract substrings separated by commas into separate variables, providing a structured way to split the string.

PHP

<?php

$string = "apple,orange,banana";

// Use sscanf to scan for non-comma
// characters and split the string
sscanf($string, "%[^,],%[^,],%s", $fruit1, $fruit2, $fruit3);

// Output each fruit
echo $fruit1 . "\n";
echo $fruit2 . "\n";
echo $fruit3 . "\n";

?>

Output

apple
orange
banana

Split String by Delimiter using substr() and strpos() Functions

Manually splits the string by using substr() and strpos() to extract substrings before and after each comma, allowing for custom handling of each part of the split string.

PHP

<?php

$string = "apple,orange,banana";

// Split the string using substr and strpos
$fruit1 = substr($string, 0, strpos($string, ','));
$restOfString = substr($string, strpos($string, ',') + 1);
$fruit2 = substr($restOfString, 0, strpos($restOfString, ','));
$fruit3 = substr($restOfString, strpos($restOfString, ',') + 1);

// Output each fruit
echo $fruit1 . "\n";
echo $fruit2 . "\n";
echo $fruit3 . "\n";

?>

Output

apple
orange
banana