How to use cURL to Get JSON Data and Decode JSON Data in PHP ?

In this article, we are going to see how to use cURL to Get JSON data and Decode JSON data in PHP.

cURL: 

• It stands for Client URL.
• It is a command line tool for sending and getting files using URL syntax.
• cURL allows communicating with other servers using HTTP, FTP, Telnet, and more.

Approach:

• We are going to fetch JSON data from one of free website, which gives JSON data for testing i.e. reqres.in
• First, we initialize curl using curl_init() method.
• Sending GET request to reqres.in server using curl_setopt() method with CURLOPT_URL to get json data.
• After that, we have to tell curl to store json data in a variable instead of dumping on screen. This is done by using CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER parameter in curl_setopt() function.
• Execute curl using curl_exec() method.
• At last, close the curl using curl_close() method.

Example:

<?php

// Initializing curl
$curl = curl_init();
  
// Sending GET request to reqres.in
// server to get JSON data
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_URL, 
    "https://reqres.in/api/users?page=2");
  
// Telling curl to store JSON
// data in a variable instead
// of dumping on screen
curl_setopt($curl, 
    CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
  
// Executing curl
$response = curl_exec($curl);

// Checking if any error occurs 
// during request or not
if($e = curl_error($curl)) {
    echo $e;
} else {
    
    // Decoding JSON data
    $decodedData = 
        json_decode($response, true); 
        
    // Outputting JSON data in
    // Decoded form
    var_dump($decodedData);
}

// Closing curl
curl_close($curl);
?>

Output: