Remove the last n elements from an array in PHP

Learn, how to remove the last element from an array in PHP.

In PHP, array are collection of elements, where the index of the first character is 0, the second character is 1, third character is 3, last character index is -1, etc.

Remove the last n elements

To remove the last n elements from an array, we can use the built-in array_slice() function by passing $array, 0, -$n as an arguments. So, it returns a new array by removing the last n elements from it.

-$n is number of elements, we need to remove from the end of an array.

Here is an example, that removes the last 3 elements from the following array

<?php
$food = array("apples", "cake", "cheese", "popcorn");
$result = array_slice($food, 0, -3);

print_r($result);
?>

Output:

Array
(
    [0] => apples
)

In the example above, we have passed 0, -3 as an arguments to the array_slice() function. So, it gives a new array by removing the last 3 elements.

Negative indexes are used to get the data from the end of a array.

Note: The array_slice() function creates the new array instead of modifying the original array.

If you want to delete n elements from the original array instead of creating a new array, you can use the array_splice function in PHP.

$food = array("apples", "cake", "cheese", "popcorn");
array_splice($food, -3);

print_r($food);

Output:

Array
(
    [0] => apples
)

-3 removes the 3 elements from the end of an array.