How can a dropdown value be properly passed to a database in PHP forms?

To properly pass a dropdown value to a database in PHP forms, you need to ensure that the selected option from the dropdown is captured and then inserted into the database using a SQL query. This can be achieved by accessing the selected value from the dropdown using the $_POST superglobal and then sanitizing the input to prevent SQL injection attacks before inserting it into the database.

// Assuming the dropdown has name attribute 'dropdown_name'
$selected_option = $_POST['dropdown_name'];

// Sanitize the input to prevent SQL injection
$selected_option = mysqli_real_escape_string($connection, $selected_option);

// Insert the selected option into the database
$sql = "INSERT INTO table_name (column_name) VALUES ('$selected_option')";
mysqli_query($connection, $sql);