How Can I Replace Umlauts in UTF-8 Strings with ASCII Equivalents in PHP?

Replacing Umlauts in UTF-8 Strings with ASCII Equivalents

In PHP, removing or replacing accented characters in UTF-8 strings can be a challenging task. Conventional methods involving UTF-8 decoding and string replacement often face limitations due to the lack of ISO-8859-15 characters in UTF-8 source files.

Replacing Umlauts

To replace accented characters, including umlauts, with their closest ASCII equivalents, an alternative approach is recommended:

Use the iconv() Function:

The iconv() function performs character set conversion, and can be used to convert a UTF-8 string to ASCII using the "//TRANSLIT" flag. This flag instructs iconv() to transliterate non-ASCII characters to their closest ASCII equivalents.

<?php
$input = "lärm";
$output = iconv("utf-8", "ascii//TRANSLIT", $input);
echo $output; // Output: larm
?>

This approach effectively replaces umlauts with their ASCII counterparts, providing a simple and efficient solution.

Extended Example:

<?php
$input = "andré";
$output = iconv("utf-8", "ascii//TRANSLIT", $input);
echo $output; // Output: andre
?>

In this extended example, the accented character "é" is replaced with its ASCII equivalent "e."

This technique offers a robust solution for handling umlauts and other accented characters in UTF-8 strings, ensuring compatibility with ASCII-only environments.

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