PHP Data Types

Data type specifies which type of value a variable has. During PHP program variables are used to store informations.

PHP supports following data types to construct our variables –

Integer
Float
String
Boolean
Array
Object
NULL
Resource

1. PHP Integers – A PHP Integer data type is a whole number (non-decimal numbers).

An Integer ranges is -2,147,483,648 and 2,147,483,647.
An Ineger must have at least one digit.
An Integer must not have a decimal point.
An Integer can be positive or negative.
Integers can be decimal (base 10), hexadecimal (base 16) format.
Default format is Decimal.

To check the datatype and value of a variable, a function var_dump() is used.

<?php 
$x = 4296;
var_dump($x);
?>

2. PHP Floats – A float is a decimal point number or an exponential form number.

For example –
33.303, 0.93993, -9390240.93493 are floating point numbers.

<?php 
$x = 93933.39;
Var_dump($x);
?>

3.PHP Boolean – Boolean data type is any data type having only true or false value, yes or no, on or off (0 or 1).

By default, the boolean data type is set to false.
Boolean data type is used for condition testing.

For example
$x = true;
$y = false;

4. PHP Array – An array is a container which holds multiple values of a single type.
For example –

$subjects = array(“English”, “Hindi”, “Math”);

5. PHP Object – An object is an instance of a class which can be containing variables, functions and data structures.
An object data type variable stores data and information.

$var1 = NULL;
$var2 = "";

Both $var1 and $var2 are two different values containing variables. $var1 has null value whereas $var2 has to assigned some values.

6. PHP resources – Resource is a special type of datatype which does not store any actual data but stores reference to some external source of data/information.

For example-
A very common example of it is Database call.

<?php
Class Car{
Function car(){
$this->model = “BMW”;
}
}

//Create an object
$newcar = new Car();
//object properties
Echo $newcar->model;
?>

7. PHP NULL – PHP Null values is used to represent only empty values. Any variable of NULL type is without any data. And its only value is NULL.
Whenever you create a variable like $car with no value in it. It is automatically assigned NULL