Chapter 11. Operators

Table of Contents
Operator Precedence
Arithmetic Operators
Assignment Operators
Bitwise Operators
Comparison Operators
Error Control Operators
Execution Operators
Incrementing/Decrementing Operators
Logical Operators
String Operators
Array Operators

Operator Precedence

The precedence of an operator specifies how "tightly" it binds two expressions together. For example, in the expression 1 + 5 * 3, the answer is 16 and not 18 because the multiplication ("*") operator has a higher precedence than the addition ("+") operator. Parentheses may be used to force precedence, if necessary. For instance: (1 + 5) * 3 evaluates to 18.

The following table lists the precedence of operators with the lowest-precedence operators listed first.

Table 11-1. Operator Precedence

AssociativityOperators
left,
leftor
leftxor
leftand
rightprint
left = += -= *= /= .= %= &= |= ^= ~= <<= >>=
left? :
left||
left&&
left|
left^
left&
non-associative== != === !==
non-associative< <= > >=
left<< >>
left+ - .
left* / %
right! ~ ++ -- (int) (float) (string) (array) (object) @
right[
non-associativenew

Note: Although ! has a higher precedence than =, PHP will still allow expressions similar to the following: if (!$a = foo()), in which case the output from foo() is put into $a.