PHP strpos() Function

PHP strpos() finds the position of the first occurrence of a text inside another string. It returns the position as a number (starting from 0), or false if the text is not found.

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Syntax

strpos(string $haystack, string $needle, int $offset = 0): int|false

Parameters

Parameter	Description
haystack	Required. The string where you search
needle	Required. The text that you want to find
offset	Optional. The position to start searching from. A negative value counts from the end

Return value: the position of the first match, or false when not found. The search is case-sensitive.

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Examples

Example #1: Find a text

<?php
echo strpos("Hello world!", "world");
?>

Output:

The word “world” starts at position 6, because the first character (H) is at position 0.

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Example #2: Search starts from an offset

<?php
echo strpos("Hello world, hello PHP", "o", 5);
?>

Output:

The search starts from position 5, so the “o” in “Hello” (position 4) is skipped, and the next “o” is found in “world”.

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Example #3: The 0 and false mistake

If the text is at the very start, strpos() returns 0, and 0 is false-like in a normal comparison. Always compare with !==.

<?php
$text = "Hello world!";

if (strpos($text, "Hello") == false) {
    echo "Wrong: says not found<br>";
}

if (strpos($text, "Hello") !== false) {
    echo "Correct: found";
}
?>

Output:

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Related functions

Function	Use
stripos()	Same as strpos(), but case-insensitive
strrpos()	Finds the last position of the text
str_contains()	PHP 8. Only checks if the text exists (true or false)
strstr()	Returns the part of the string from the match. See strstr vs stristr

<?php
echo stripos("Hello World", "world") . "<br>";
echo strrpos("Hello world, hello PHP", "hello");
?>

Output:

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