How to Convert Newlines to HTML Breaks with PHP’s nl2br Function

The nl2br function in PHP inserts an HTML line break tag ( <br /> or <br>) before each newline character in a given string and returns the modified string.

Parameters

string : The input string to be processed.

is_xhtml (optional, boolean): Determines whether to use XHTML‑compatible line breaks ( <br />) when set to true. The default is true.

Return value

The function returns the adjusted string with HTML break tags inserted.

Example 1

<?php
echo nl2br("foo isn't
 bar");
?>

Output:

foo isn't<br /> bar

Example 2

<?php
echo nl2br("Welcome
This is my HTML document", false);
?>

Output:

Welcome<br>This is my HTML document

Example 3

<?php
$string = "This
is
\ra
string\r";
echo nl2br($string);
?>

Output:

This<br />is<br />a<br />string<br />