PHP Manual: Checks whether a file or directory exists

Description

bool file_exists ( string $filename )

Checks whether a file or directory exists.

Parameters

filename

Path to the file or directory.

On windows, use //computername/share/filename or \\computername\share\filename to check files on network shares.

Return Values

Returns TRUE if the file or directory specified by filename exists; FALSE otherwise.

Note:
This function will return FALSE for symlinks pointing to non-existing files.

Warning

This function returns FALSE for files inaccessible due to safe mode restrictions. However these files still can be included if they are located in safe_mode_include_dir.

Note:
The check is done using the real UID/GID instead of the effective one.

Note: Because PHP's integer type is signed and many platforms use 32bit integers, some filesystem functions may return unexpected results for files which are larger than 2GB.

Examples

Example #1 Testing whether a file exists


<?php
$filename = '/path/to/foo.txt';

if (file_exists($filename)) {
    echo "The file $filename exists";
} else {
    echo "The file $filename does not exist";
}
?>

Errors/Exceptions

Upon failure, an E_WARNING is emitted.

Notes

Note: The results of this function are cached. See clearstatcache for more details.

Tip

As of PHP 5.0.0, this function can also be used with some URL wrappers. Refer to Supported Protocols and Wrappers to determine which wrappers support stat family of functionality.