rhlt/env

A basic and efficient .env file parser, to load environment variables from a file. With flexible support for variable interpolation and graceful syntax errors handling.

v1.0.0 2025-10-07 22:50 UTC

MIT

README

This is a small PHP script that can parse and load .env files into environment variables. At only 5 KB, it is intended to be simpler and more efficient than existing library solutions.

Basic usage

Available via Composer (composer require rhlt/env), or by manually including env.php. It contains a single function load_dontenv($path):

include 'env.php'; // "include" is needed only when not using Composer
load_dotenv('.env');

// Now you can access them wherever, for example:
$credentials = [
    'user' => getenv('API_USER'),
    'token' => getenv('API_TOKEN'), 
];

The idea is to keep sensitive or environment specific values in an .env file, which is not committed to source control. They are available in scripts through getenv() as well as through $_ENV[] and $_SERVER[].

Example .env files

Basic syntax:

API_USER=username
API_TOKEN=p@sswørd

Additional examples:

VAR1=value # this is a comment
VAR2='single-quoted value'
VAR3="double quoted value"

# Another comment
VAR4='Use quotes to add the # symbol in a value'
VAR5="Double-quoted values (only) allow \\backslash \"escaping\"\nand newlines"

# Whitespace
VAR6 = Whitespace is allowed
   VAR7     = excessive whitespace is trimmed
VAR8        = '  Whitespace is kept when the value is quoted.   '  
VAR9=
# VAR9 is an empty value (alternatively: VAR9="", or VAR9='')

# Variable interpolation: ${NAME}
VAR10=example.com
VAR11=email@${VAR10} # [e-mail]
VAR12="You can reach us at ${VAR11}"
VAR13="Backslash escape to get a literal \${VALUE}"
VAR14='The content of single ${QUOTES} is always untouched'

Lines with invalid data will be ignored
VAR15="Quoted value" this will be ignored
VAR16='Value is stored even if the final quote is missing # this is not a comment

Syntax errors are handled as gracefully as possible. Note that all variables need to be a single line. Newlines must be entered as \n (or \r\n if desired) between "double quotes". The file encoding must be ASCII-compatible (such as UTF-8).