Strip whitespace (or other characters) from the beginning and end of a string

substr
ucfirst
String Functions
PHP Manual

# trim

(PHP 4, PHP 5)

trim — Strip whitespace (or other characters) from the beginning and end of a string

### Description

string trim ( string `$str` [, string `$charlist` ] )

This function returns a string with whitespace stripped from the beginning and end of `str`. Without the second parameter, trim() will strip these characters:

- " " (ASCII 32 (0x20)), an ordinary space.
- "\t" (ASCII 9 (0x09)), a tab.
- "\n" (ASCII 10 (0x0A)), a new line (line feed).
- "\r" (ASCII 13 (0x0D)), a carriage return.
- "\0" (ASCII 0 (0x00)), the NUL-byte.
- "\x0B" (ASCII 11 (0x0B)), a vertical tab.

### Parameters

`str`

  The string that will be trimmed.

`charlist`

  Optionally, the stripped characters can also be specified using the `charlist` parameter. Simply list all characters that you want to be stripped. With .. you can specify a range of characters.

### Return Values

The trimmed string.

### Changelog

Version | Description
--- | ---
4.1.0 | The optional `charlist` parameter was added.

### Examples

Example #1 Usage example of trim()

`<?php
$text = "\t\tThese are a few words :) ... ";
$binary = "\x09Example string\x0A";
$hello = "Hello World";
var_dump($text, $binary, $hello);
print "\n";
$trimmed = trim($text);
var_dump($trimmed);
$trimmed = trim($text, " \t.");
var_dump($trimmed);
$trimmed = trim($hello, "Hdle");
var_dump($trimmed);
// trim the ASCII control characters at the beginning and end of $binary
// (from 0 to 31 inclusive)
$clean = trim($binary, "\x00..\x1F");
var_dump($clean);
?>`

The above example will output:

    string(32) "        These are a few words :) ...  "
    string(16) "    Example string
    "
    string(11) "Hello World"

    string(28) "These are a few words :) ..."
    string(24) "These are a few words :)"
    string(5) "o Wor"
    string(14) "Example string"

Example #2 Trimming array values with trim()

`<?php
function trim_value(&$value)
{
$value = trim($value);
}
$fruit = array('apple','banana ', ' cranberry ');
var_dump($fruit);
array_walk($fruit, 'trim_value');
var_dump($fruit);
?>`

The above example will output:

    array(3) {
      [0]=>
      string(5) "apple"
      [1]=>
      string(7) "banana "
      [2]=>
      string(11) " cranberry "
    }
    array(3) {
      [0]=>
      string(5) "apple"
      [1]=>
      string(6) "banana"
      [2]=>
      string(9) "cranberry"
    }

### See Also

- ltrim() - Strip whitespace (or other characters) from the beginning of a string
- rtrim() - Strip whitespace (or other characters) from the end of a string

substr
ucfirst
String Functions
PHP Manual