Using PHP rawurldecode() to Decode URL‑Encoded Strings

In web development, URLs often contain special characters that must be encoded, and sometimes they need to be decoded back to their original form. PHP provides the rawurldecode() function for this purpose.

The rawurldecode() function decodes a URL‑encoded string, typically one produced by urlencode() , restoring it to its original representation.

Syntax:

string rawurldecode ( string $str )

Here $str is the URL‑encoded string to decode, and the function returns the decoded string.

Example usage:

<?php
$url = "https%3A%2F%2Fwww.example.com%2F%3Fq%3D%D0%B4%D0%BE%D0%B1%D1%80%D1%8B%D0%B9%E6%B1%89%E5%AD%97"; // URL encoded by urlencode()
$decodedUrl = rawurldecode($url);
echo $decodedUrl;
?>

Running the script outputs:

https://www.example.com/?q=добрый汉字

Note that rawurldecode() only decodes special characters in the URL; it does not process other characters in query parameters. To decode an entire URL, use urldecode() instead.

In summary, rawurldecode() is a convenient PHP function for decoding URLs that were encoded with urlencode() , helping ensure correct transmission and parsing of URL parameters in backend development.