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PHP nl2br() Function

❮ PHP String Reference

Example

Insert line breaks where newlines (\n) occur in the string:

<?php
echo nl2br("One line.\nAnother line.");
?>

The browser output of the code above will be:

One line.
Another line.

The HTML output of the code above will be (View Source):

One line.<br />
Another line.
Run example »

Definition and Usage

The nl2br() function inserts HTML line breaks (<br> or <br />) in front of each newline (\n) in a string.


Syntax

nl2br(string,xhtml)

Parameter Description
string Required. Specifies the string to check
xhtml  Optional. A boolean value that indicates whether or not to use XHTML compatible line breaks:
  • TRUE- Default. Inserts <br />
  • FALSE - Inserts <br>

Technical Details

Return Value: Returns the converted string
PHP Version: 4+
Changelog: Before PHP 4.0.5, this function inserted <br>. After PHP 4.0.5 it inserts the XHTML compliant <br />

The xhtml parameter was added in PHP 5.3.

More Examples

Example 1

Insert line breaks where newlines (\n) occur, using the xhtml parameter:

<?php
echo nl2br("One line.\nAnother line.",false);
?>

The browser output of the code above will be:

One line.
Another line.

The HTML output of the code above will be (View Source):

One line.<br>
Another line.
Run example »

❮ PHP String Reference