Runtime Configuration
PHP Manual

The configuration file

The configuration file (php.ini) is read when PHP starts up. For the server module versions of PHP, this happens only once when the web server is started. For the CGI and CLI versions, it happens on every invocation.

php.ini is searched for in these locations (in order):

If php-SAPI.ini exists (where SAPI is the SAPI in use, so, for example, php-cli.ini or php-apache.ini), it is used instead of php.ini. The SAPI name can be determined with php_sapi_name().

Note:

The Apache web server changes the directory to root at startup, causing PHP to attempt to read php.ini from the root filesystem if it exists.

Using environment variables can be used in php.ini as shown below.

Example #1 php.ini Environment Variables

; PHP_MEMORY_LIMIT is taken from environment
memory_limit = ${PHP_MEMORY_LIMIT}

The php.ini directives handled by extensions are documented on the respective pages of the extensions themselves. A list of the core directives is available in the appendix. Not all PHP directives are necessarily documented in this manual: for a complete list of directives available in your PHP version, please read your well commented php.ini file. Alternatively, you may find » the latest php.ini from Git helpful too.

Example #2 php.ini example

; any text on a line after an unquoted semicolon (;) is ignored
[php] ; section markers (text within square brackets) are also ignored
; Boolean values can be set to either:
;    true, on, yes
; or false, off, no, none
register_globals = off
track_errors = yes

; you can enclose strings in double-quotes
include_path = ".:/usr/local/lib/php"

; backslashes are treated the same as any other character
include_path = ".;c:\php\lib"

Since PHP 5.1.0, it is possible to refer to existing .ini variables from within .ini files. Example: open_basedir = ${open_basedir} ":/new/dir".

Scan directories

It is possible to configure PHP to scan for .ini files in a directory after reading php.ini. This can be done at compile time by setting the --with-config-file-scan-dir option. In PHP 5.2.0 and later, the scan directory can then be overridden at run time by setting the PHP_INI_SCAN_DIR environment variable.

It is possible to scan multiple directories by separating them with the platform-specific path separator (; on Windows, NetWare and RISC OS; : on all other platforms; the value PHP is using is available as the PATH_SEPARATOR constant). If a blank directory is given in PHP_INI_SCAN_DIR, PHP will also scan the directory given at compile time via --with-config-file-scan-dir .

Within each directory, PHP will scan all files ending in .ini in alphabetical order. A list of the files that were loaded, and in what order, is available by calling php_ini_scanned_files(), or by running PHP with the --ini option.

Assuming PHP is configured with --with-config-file-scan-dir=/etc/php.d,
and that the path separator is :...

$ php
  PHP will load all files in /etc/php.d/*.ini as configuration files.

$ PHP_INI_SCAN_DIR=/usr/local/etc/php.d php
  PHP will load all files in /usr/local/etc/php.d/*.ini as
  configuration files.

$ PHP_INI_SCAN_DIR=:/usr/local/etc/php.d php
  PHP will load all files in /etc/php.d/*.ini, then
  /usr/local/etc/php.d/*.ini as configuration files.

$ PHP_INI_SCAN_DIR=/usr/local/etc/php.d: php
  PHP will load all files in /usr/local/etc/php.d/*.ini, then
  /etc/php.d/*.ini as configuration files.

Changelog

Version Description
7.0.0 Hash marks (#) are no longer recognized as comments.
5.3.0 Hash marks (#) should no longer be used as comments and will throw a deprecation warning if used.
5.2.0 The PHP_INI_SCAN_DIR environment variable can be set to override the scan directory set via the configure script.
5.1.0 It is possible to refer to existing .ini variables from within .ini files.


Runtime Configuration
PHP Manual