What are some common challenges when parsing JSON data in PHP?

One common challenge when parsing JSON data in PHP is handling errors that may occur during the decoding process, such as malformed JSON syntax or encoding issues. To address this, you can use try-catch blocks to catch any exceptions thrown by the json_decode function and handle them accordingly.

$jsonData = '{"name": "John", "age": 30}';
try {
    $decodedData = json_decode($jsonData);
    if ($decodedData === null && json_last_error() !== JSON_ERROR_NONE) {
        throw new Exception('Error decoding JSON: ' . json_last_error_msg());
    }
    // Process the decoded JSON data here
} catch (Exception $e) {
    echo 'An error occurred: ' . $e->getMessage();
}