How do I use the ternary operator ( ? : ) in PHP as a shorthand for “if / else”?

Question

Based on the examples from this page, I have the working and non-working code samples below.

Working code using if statement:

if (!empty         


        

Answer 1

If first variable($a) is null, then assign value of second variable($b) to first variable($a)

 $a = 5;
 $b = 10;   

 $a != ''?$a: $a = $b;

 echo $a;

Answer 2

You can do this even shorter by replacing echo with <?= code ?>

<?=(empty($storeData['street2'])) ? 'Yes <br />' : 'No <br />'?>

This is useful especially when you want to determine, inside a navbar, whether the menu option should be displayed as already visited (clicked) or not:

<li<?=($basename=='index.php' ? ' class="active"' : '')?>><a href="index.php">Home</a></li>

Answer 3

Ternary Operator is basically shorthand for if/else statement. We can use to reduce few lines of code and increases readability.

Your code looks cleaner to me. But we can add more cleaner way as follows-

$test = (empty($address['street2'])) ? 'Yes <br />' : 'No <br />';

Another way-

$test = ((empty($address['street2'])) ? 'Yes <br />' : 'No <br />');

Note- I have added bracket to whole expression to make it cleaner. I used to do this usually to increase readability. With PHP7 we can use Null Coalescing Operator / php 7 ?? operator for better approach. But your requirement it does not fit.

Answer 4

There's also a shorthand ternary operator and it looks like this:

(expression1) ?: expression2 will return expression1 if it evaluates to true or expression2 otherwise.

Example:

$a = 'Apples';
echo ($a ?: 'Oranges') . ' are great!';

will return

Apples are great!

Since PHP 5.3, it is possible to leave out the middle part of the ternary operator. Expression expr1 ?: expr3 returns expr1 if expr1 evaluates to TRUE, and expr3 otherwise.

From the PHP Manual

Answer 5

Quick and short way:

echo $address['street2'] ? : "No";

Here are some interesting examples, with one or more varied conditions.

$color = "blue";

// Condition #1 Show color without specifying variable 
echo $color ? : "Undefined";
echo "<br>";

// Condition #2
echo $color ? $color : "Undefined";
echo "<br>";

// Condition #3
echo ($color) ? $color : "Undefined";
echo "<br>";

// Condition #4
echo ($color == "blue") ? $color : "Undefined";
echo "<br>";

// Condition #5
echo ($color == "" ? $color : ($color == "blue" ? $color : "Undefined"));
echo "<br>";

// Condition #6
echo ($color == "blue" ? $color : ($color == "" ? $color : ($color == "" ? $color : "Undefined")));
echo "<br>";

// Condition #7
echo ($color != "") ? ($color != "" ? ($color == "blue" ? $color : "Undefined") : "Undefined") : "Undefined";
echo "<br>";

Answer 6

Conditional Welcome Message

echo 'Welcome '.($user['is_logged_in'] ? $user['first_name'] : 'Guest').'!';

Nested PHP Shorthand

echo 'Your score is:  '.($score > 10 ? ($age > 10 ? 'Average' : 'Exceptional') : ($age > 10 ? 'Horrible' : 'Average') );