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# utf8_encode

(PHP 3>= 3.0.6, PHP 4 )

utf8_encode -- encodes an ISO-8859-1 string to UTF-8

## Description

string utf8_encode ( string data)

This function encodes the string `data` to `UTF-8`, and returns the encoded version. `UTF-8` is a standard mechanism used by Unicode for encoding wide character values into a byte stream. `UTF-8` is transparent to plain ASCII characters, is self-synchronized (meaning it is possible for a program to figure out where in the bytestream characters start) and can be used with normal string comparison functions for sorting and such. PHP encodes `UTF-8` characters in up to four bytes, like this:

Table 1. UTF-8 encoding

bytes | bits | representation
--- | --- | ---
1 | 7 | 0bbbbbbb
2 | 11 | 110bbbbb 10bbbbbb
3 | 16 | 1110bbbb 10bbbbbb 10bbbbbb
4 | 21 | 11110bbb 10bbbbbb 10bbbbbb 10bbbbbb

Each `b` represents a bit that can be used to store character data.

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