PHP Echo and Print Statements

In this tutorial you will learn how to use the PHP echo and print statements to display the output in a web browser.

The PHP echo Statement

The echo statement can output one or more strings. In general terms, the echo statement can display anything that can be displayed to the browser, such as string, numbers, variables values, the results of expressions etc.

Since echo is a language construct not actually a function (like if statement), you can use it without parentheses e.g. echo or echo(). However, if you want to pass more than one parameter to echo, the parameters must not be enclosed within parentheses.

Display Strings of Text

The following example will show you how to display a string of text with the echo statement:

<?php
// Displaying string of text
echo "Hello World!";
?>

The output of the above PHP code will look something like this:

Display HTML Code

The following example will show you how to display HTML code using the echo statement:

<?php
// Displaying HTML code
echo "<h4>This is a simple heading.</h4>";
echo "<h4 style='color: red;'>This is heading with style.</h4>";
?>

The output of the above PHP code will look something like this:

Display Variables

The following example will show you how to display variable using the echo statement:

<?php
// Defining variables
$txt = "Hello World!";
$num = 123456789;
$colors = array("Red", "Green", "Blue");
 
// Displaying variables
echo $txt;
echo "<br>";
echo $num;
echo "<br>";
echo $colors[0];
?>

The output of the above PHP code will look something like this:

The PHP print Statement

You can also use the print statement (an alternative to echo) to display output to the browser. Like echo the print is also a language construct not a real function. So you can also use it without parentheses like: print or print().

Both echo and print statement works exactly the same way except that the print statement can only output one string, and always returns 1. That's why the echo statement considered marginally faster than the print statement since it doesn't return any value.

Display Strings of Text

The following example will show you how to display a string of text with the print statement:

<?php
// Displaying string of text
print "Hello World!";
?>

The output of the above PHP code will look something like this:

Display HTML Code

The following example will show you how to display HTML code using the print statement:

<?php
// Displaying HTML code
print "<h4>This is a simple heading.</h4>";
print "<h4 style='color: red;'>This is heading with style.</h4>";
?>

The output of the above PHP code will look something like this:

Display Variables

The following example will show you how to display variable using the print statement:

<?php
// Defining variables
$txt = "Hello World!";
$num = 123456789;
$colors = array("Red", "Green", "Blue");
 
// Displaying variables
print $txt;
print "<br>";
print $num;
print "<br>";
print $colors[0];
?>

The output of the above PHP code will look something like this: