Master PHP’s array_merge: Combine Arrays Effortlessly with Real Examples

PHP offers many powerful functions for handling arrays, and array_merge() is one of the most useful. It merges one or more arrays into a new array and returns the result.

Syntax

array_merge ( array $array1 [, array $... ] ) : array

Example 1: Merging Two Arrays

$array1 = array('apple', 'banana', 'orange');
$array2 = array('kiwi', 'melon', 'grape');
$result = array_merge($array1, $array2);
print_r($result);

Output:

Array
(
    [0] => apple
    [1] => banana
    [2] => orange
    [3] => kiwi
    [4] => melon
    [5] => grape
)

The two original arrays are combined into a single array containing all elements in order.

Example 2: Merging Multiple Arrays

$array1 = array('apple', 'banana', 'orange');
$array2 = array('kiwi', 'melon', 'grape');
$array3 = array('strawberry', 'pineapple');
$result = array_merge($array1, $array2, $array3);
print_r($result);

Output:

Array
(
    [0] => apple
    [1] => banana
    [2] => orange
    [3] => kiwi
    [4] => melon
    [5] => grape
    [6] => strawberry
    [7] => pineapple
)

All three arrays are merged, preserving the order of elements from each source array.

Example 3: Merging Associative Arrays

$array1 = array('name' => 'John', 'age' => 25);
$array2 = array('name' => 'Jane', 'email' => '[email protected]');
$result = array_merge($array1, $array2);
print_r($result);

Output:

Array
(
    [name] => Jane
    [age] => 25
    [email] => [email protected]
)

When keys overlap, the later array’s value overwrites the earlier one, so the final array keeps the last value for each duplicate key.

Conclusion

The array_merge() function is a concise and efficient way to combine both indexed and associative arrays in PHP. It simplifies data handling by allowing developers to merge any number of arrays, with clear behavior for duplicate keys.