How can PHP be used to output special characters in HTML?

Special characters in HTML, such as &, <, >, ", and ', need to be properly encoded in order to be displayed correctly in the browser. PHP provides a function called htmlspecialchars() that can be used to convert these special characters into their corresponding HTML entities. By using this function, you can ensure that special characters are displayed correctly in your HTML output.

&lt;?php
// Outputting special characters in HTML using PHP
$specialString = &quot;This is a special string with &lt;, &gt;, and &amp; characters.&quot;;
echo htmlspecialchars($specialString);
?&gt;