In PHP 8.0 a handy new function was added that allows you to determine if one string contains another substring. This is the str_contains function.

It is used like this:

<?php
str_contains('Hello World', 'Hello');

Returns true. If the string is not found, this returns false. Nice and simple!

If you’re using an older version of PHP, you may want to do something like this.

<?php
strpos('Hello World', 'Hello') !== false;

strpos returns the position in which the substring exists in the string (the very beginning being position 0, so a 0 return also means that the substring was found). This is less direct and readable than the new str_contains function but will work on much older versions of PHP.

What is the difference between strpos vs stripos?

strpos is case-sensitive so the capitalization must match. There is also a stripos function that is case insensitive so capitalization doesn’t matter.

<?php
stripos('Hello World', 'hello') !== false;

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