How to Fix UTF-8 Encoding Issues in PDO and MySQL?

UTF-8 Encoding Issue in PDO and MySQL Explained

When working with PDO and MySQL in PHP, users may encounter a problem inserting UTF-8 encoded data into the database. The data appears garbled as '?' characters upon insertion. This issue stems from a lack of proper UTF-8 charset configuration.

To resolve this issue, it's crucial to execute the SET NAMES and SET CHARACTER SET queries after establishing the PDO connection. However, in certain scenarios, these queries alone may not resolve the problem.

As per the provided answer, it's recommended to employ an alternative approach:

<code class="php">$pdo = new PDO(
    'mysql:host=hostname;dbname=defaultDbName',
    'username',
    'password',
    array(PDO::MYSQL_ATTR_INIT_COMMAND => "SET NAMES utf8")
);</code>

By adding the PDO::MYSQL_ATTR_INIT_COMMAND option, UTF-8 is enforced during PDO connection initialization. This method effectively solves the UTF-8 encoding issue by ensuring the database connection is set to UTF-8 from the outset.

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