How to create an array from a CSV file using PHP and the fgetcsv function

user_155509 0
Viewed 349989

Can someone kindly provide a code to create an array from a CSV file using fgetcsv?

I've used the following code to create an array from a simple CSV file, but it doesn't work right when one of my fields has multiple commas - such as addresses.

$lines =file('CSV Address.csv');

foreach($lines as $data)
{
list($name[],$address[],$status[])
= explode(',',$data);
}

*Also, str_getcsv is not supported by my hosting service.

The above code doesn't work with the following CSV file example. First column is name, second column is address, third column is marital status.

Scott L. Aranda,"123 Main Street, Bethesda, Maryland 20816",Single
Todd D. Smith,"987 Elm Street, Alexandria, Virginia 22301",Single
Edward M. Grass,"123 Main Street, Bethesda, Maryland 20816",Married
Aaron G. Frantz,"987 Elm Street, Alexandria, Virginia 22301",Married
Ryan V. Turner,"123 Main Street, Bethesda, Maryland 20816",Single
csv arrays php
15 Answers

Like you said in your title, fgetcsv is the way to go. It's pretty darn easy to use.

$file = fopen('myCSVFile.csv', 'r');
while (($line = fgetcsv($file)) !== FALSE) {
  //$line is an array of the csv elements
  print_r($line);
}
fclose($file);

You'll want to put more error checking in there in case fopen() fails, but this works to read a CSV file line by line and parse the line into an array.

user_1157300

I think the str_getcsv() syntax is much cleaner, it also doesn't require the CSV to be stored in the file system.

$csv = str_getcsv(file_get_contents('myCSVFile.csv'));

echo '<pre>';
print_r($csv);
echo '</pre>';

Or for a line by line solution:

$csv = array();
$lines = file('myCSVFile.csv', FILE_IGNORE_NEW_LINES);

foreach ($lines as $key => $value)
{
    $csv[$key] = str_getcsv($value);
}

echo '<pre>';
print_r($csv);
echo '</pre>';

Or for a line by line solution with no str_getcsv():

$csv = array();
$file = fopen('myCSVFile.csv', 'r');

while (($result = fgetcsv($file)) !== false)
{
    $csv[] = $result;
}

fclose($file);

echo '<pre>';
print_r($csv);
echo '</pre>';
user_897710

I have created a function which will convert a csv string to an array. The function knows how to escape special characters, and it works with or without enclosure chars.

$dataArray = csvstring_to_array( file_get_contents('Address.csv'));

I tried it with your csv sample and it works as expected!

function csvstring_to_array($string, $separatorChar = ',', $enclosureChar = '"', $newlineChar = "\n") {
    // @author: Klemen Nagode
    $array = array();
    $size = strlen($string);
    $columnIndex = 0;
    $rowIndex = 0;
    $fieldValue="";
    $isEnclosured = false;
    for($i=0; $i<$size;$i++) {

        $char = $string{$i};
        $addChar = "";

        if($isEnclosured) {
            if($char==$enclosureChar) {

                if($i+1<$size && $string{$i+1}==$enclosureChar){
                    // escaped char
                    $addChar=$char;
                    $i++; // dont check next char
                }else{
                    $isEnclosured = false;
                }
            }else {
                $addChar=$char;
            }
        }else {
            if($char==$enclosureChar) {
                $isEnclosured = true;
            }else {

                if($char==$separatorChar) {

                    $array[$rowIndex][$columnIndex] = $fieldValue;
                    $fieldValue="";

                    $columnIndex++;
                }elseif($char==$newlineChar) {
                    echo $char;
                    $array[$rowIndex][$columnIndex] = $fieldValue;
                    $fieldValue="";
                    $columnIndex=0;
                    $rowIndex++;
                }else {
                    $addChar=$char;
                }
            }
        }
        if($addChar!=""){
            $fieldValue.=$addChar;

        }
    }

    if($fieldValue) { // save last field
        $array[$rowIndex][$columnIndex] = $fieldValue;
    }
    return $array;
}
user_3227910

If you want each line to be in an array, and each cell in the line in array:

$file = fopen('csvFile.csv', 'r');              // Open the file                     
while (($line = fgetcsv($file)) !== FALSE) {    // Read one line
    $array[] =$line;                            // Add the line in the main array
}
echo '<pre>';
print_r($array);   //print it out
echo '</pre>'; 
fclose($file);
user_104166650 
 function csvToArray($path)
{
    try{
        $csv = fopen($path, 'r');
        $rows = [];
        $header = [];
        $index = 0;
        while (($line = fgetcsv($csv)) !== FALSE) {
            if ($index == 0) {
                $header = $line;
                $index = 1;
            } else {
                $row = [];
                for ($i = 0; $i < count($header); $i++) {
                    $row[$header[$i]] = $line[$i];
                }
                array_push($rows, $row);
            }
        }
        return $rows;
    }catch (Exception $exception){
        return false;
    }
}
user_48590650 
convertToArray(file_get_content($filename));

function convertToArray(string $content): array
{
   $data = str_getcsv($content,"\n");
   array_walk($data, function(&$a) use ($data) {
       $a = str_getcsv($a);
   });

   return $data;
}
user_104455780

I've made an utility in PHP that converts CSV data from a file or string to an array of objects, and also offers an option to group the items by an specific column, and you can also change the delimiter from comma to any character you want.

Example:

Brand, Model, Year
Volkswagen, Gol,2008
Fiat, Uno, 2007
Fiat, Palio, 2002
Fiat, Mobi, 2021
Volkswagen, Jetta, 2018
Hyunday, HB20, 2020

Returns: Array made out of CSV

Group by examples:

Grouping by the 'Brand' column

Grouping by the 'Year' column

You can find the code here: https://github.com/raphah96/PHPCSV

I deal a lot with CSV so that's why I had to made a consistent utility instead of a simple one time use code.

user_103318190
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