What is the purpose of using GROUP_CONCAT in a MySQL query in PHP?

When using GROUP_CONCAT in a MySQL query in PHP, the purpose is to concatenate the values of a column within each group into a single string. This can be useful when you want to display multiple values from a column in a single row, such as when fetching related data from multiple rows in a single query result.

// Connect to database
$mysqli = new mysqli("localhost", "username", "password", "database");

// Query to select and concatenate values from a column
$query = "SELECT group_id, GROUP_CONCAT(value) AS concatenated_values FROM table_name GROUP BY group_id";

// Execute the query
$result = $mysqli->query($query);

// Fetch and display the results
while ($row = $result->fetch_assoc()) {
    echo "Group ID: " . $row['group_id'] . "<br>";
    echo "Concatenated Values: " . $row['concatenated_values'] . "<br>";
}