What are the differences between urlencode and rawurlencode functions in PHP and when should each be used?

urlencode and rawurlencode are two functions in PHP used to encode special characters in a string for use in a URL. The main difference between them is that urlencode encodes spaces as "+" while rawurlencode encodes spaces as "%20". urlencode should be used when encoding query string parameters for URLs, as it is more readable and compatible with web servers. On the other hand, rawurlencode should be used when encoding the entire URL, including the path and query string, as it ensures all characters are properly encoded. 

// Using urlencode
$query = "search term with spaces";
$encoded_query = urlencode($query);
echo $encoded_query; // Outputs: search+term+with+spaces

// Using rawurlencode
$url = "https://www.example.com/search?query=search term with spaces";
$encoded_url = rawurlencode($url);
echo $encoded_url; // Outputs: https%3A%2F%2Fwww.example.com%2Fsearch%3Fquery%3Dsearch%20term%20with%20spaces

Keywords

urlencode rawurlencode PHP differences use cases

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