How to save data as a CSV file using PHP

There are multiple instances when you need to store the data as a file instead of outputting it in the browser. One common example is to store the data in a CSV (Comma Separated Values) file. You can output a file saving dialogue sending appropriate headers to the browser. Below is the example written in PHP. The code is commented so I hope there will be no difficulty in understanding.

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print?

01.

02.

03.// save the CSV data in a variable

04.$csvData = "name,email\n";

05.$csvData.= "waseem,waseem@waseem.com\n";

06.$csvData.= "ikram,ikram@ikram.com";

07.

08.// filename to save data

09.$filename = "sample.csv";

10.

11.// open file in write mode

12.$fh = fopen($filename, "w");

13.

14.// write data to the file

15.fwrite($fh, $csvData);

16.

17.// close the file

18.fclose($fh);

19.

20.// send headers to output the CSV data as a file

21.header("Cache-Control: must-revalidate, post-check=0, pre-check=0");

22.header("Content-Length: " . strlen($csvData));

23.header("Content-type: text/x-csv");

24.header("Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=$filename");

25.echo $csvData;

26.

27.?>