PHP printf vs sprintf

printf will output a formatted string using placeholders.

sprintf will return the formatted string

$name = 'Jeff';
printf("Hello %s, How's it going?", $name);
$greeting = sprintf("Hello %s, How's it going?", $name);
echo $greeting;

Output

Hello Jeff, How's it going?
Hello Jeff, How's it going?

It is also possible to format a number with these 2 functions. This can be used to format a decimal value used to represent money so that it always has 2 decimal digits.

$money = 25.2;
printf('%01.2f', $money);

Output

25.20

The two functions vprintf and vsprintf operate as printf and sprintf, but accept a format string and an array of values, instead of individual variables.

Conclusion

In this page (written and validated by A. Gawali) you learned about PHP printf vs sprintf . What's Next? If you are interested in completing PHP tutorial, your next topic will be learning about: PHP Outputting a structured view of arrays and objects.

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