Create MySQL Table using PHP MySQLi Script

This article is created to describe, how to create a MySQL table using PHP MySQLi script. I have approached the following two ways, to do the task:

• Using PHP MySQLi object-oriented script
• Using PHP MySQLi procedural script

Whatever we choose the approach to create a table using PHP MySQLi script. Some main steps, we have to follow are:

• Open a connection to the database
• Write the SQL statement regarding the table creation
• Initialize the written SQL statement to a variable
• Use this variable to perform the query against the MySQL database
• Close the database connection

For example, in this article, to create a table, I am going to use following SQL code:

CREATE TABLE customer (
   id INT(6) UNSIGNED AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
   name VARCHAR(30) NOT NULL,
   age INT(2),
   email VARCHAR(40) NOT NULL)

This SQL query creates a table named customer with following columns:

• id
• name
• age
• email

while creating the columns, be sure to provide the data type of the column along with size.

Note - The UNSIGNED keyword is used, when we do not want any negative value to be inserted in the column, in any way.

Note - The AUTO_INCREMENT is used to increment the value by 1 each time, on the insertion of a new row.

Note - The PRIMARY KEY is used when we need to specify a column as a primary column. The primary column (field) uniquely identifies, each row (record) in the table.

Note - The VARCHAR refers to a string that can consists of letters, numbers, and special characters.

Note - The INT refers to a medium size integer. The range of signed int are from -2147483648 to 2147483647.

Note - The NOT NULL is used for, not to accept NULL values.

Create MySQL Table using PHP MySQLi Object-Oriented Script

To create a MySQL table using PHP MySQLi object-oriented script, follow the example given below:

<?php
   $servername = "localhost";
   $username = "root";
   $password = "";
   $dbname = "fresherearth";
   
   $conn = new mysqli($servername, $username, $password, $dbname);
   
   if($conn->connect_errno)
   {
      echo "Connection to the database failed!<BR>";
      echo "Reason: ", $conn->connect_error;
      exit();
   }
   
   $sql = "CREATE TABLE customer (
      id INT(6) UNSIGNED AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
      name VARCHAR(30) NOT NULL,
      age INT(2),
      email VARCHAR(40) NOT NULL
   )";
   
   $qry = $conn->query($sql);
   if($qry)
   {
      echo "Table created successfully.";
      
      // block of code, to process further...
   }
   else
   {
      echo "Table has not been created!<BR>";
      echo "Reason: ", $conn->error;
   }
   $conn->close();
?>

The output produced by above PHP example on creating a table is shown in the snapshot given below:

Since the table named customer is created in the database named fresherearth. Therefore if you open the MySQL database server, and then fresherearth database. There, you will see the customer table with four columns namely id, name, age, and email. Here is the snapshot of the table:

That is:

Now let me re-execute the above PHP script again. Okay, here is the output I have got:

That is:

Fatal error: Uncaught mysqli_sql_exception: Table 'customer' already exists in C:\xampp\htdocs\index.php:23 Stack trace: #0 C:\xampp\htdocs\index.php(23): mysqli->query('CREATE TABLE cu...') #1 {main} thrown in C:\xampp\htdocs\index.php on line 23

Saying that the table named customer already exists. This output is produced because, I have already created the table customer using the previous PHP MySQLi object-oriented script.

But the problem with above output is, the error we are seeing, is not that I have written in script. That is because of the default error reporting mode. Therefore, to print our own error message, we need to change the mode using either mysqli_driver() (for object-oriented script) or mysqli_report() (for procedural script). For example:

<?php
   $driver = new mysqli_driver();
   $driver -> report_mode = MYSQLI_REPORT_OFF;
   
   $conn = new mysqli("localhost", "root", "", "fresherearth");
   
   if($conn->connect_errno)
   {
      echo "Connection to the database failed!<BR>";
      echo "Reason: ", $conn->connect_error;
      exit();
   }
   
   $sqlCode = "CREATE TABLE customer (
      id INT(6) UNSIGNED AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
      name VARCHAR(30) NOT NULL,
      age INT(2),
      email VARCHAR(40) NOT NULL
   )";
   
   if(!$conn->query($sqlCode))
   {
      echo "Table has not been created!<BR>";
      echo "Reason: ", $conn->error;
   }
   // block of code to process further
   
   $conn->close();
?>

Now the output should be:

Table has not been created!
Reason: Table 'customer' already exists

Note - The mysqli() is used to open a connection to the MySQL database server, in object-oriented style.

Note - The new keyword is used to create a new object.

Note - The connect_errno is used to get/return the error code (if any) from last connect call, in object-oriented style.

Note - The connect_error is used to get the error description (if any) from last connection, in object-oriented style.

Note - The query() is used to perform query on the MySQL database, in object-oriented style.

Note - The error is used to return the description of error (if any), by the most recent function call, in object-oriented style.

Note - The close() is used to close an opened connection, in object-oriented style.

Note - The mysqli_driver() is used to modify the error reporting mode, in object-oriented style.

Create MySQL Table using PHP MySQLi Procedural Script

To create a MySQL table using PHP MySQLi procedural script, follow the example given below:

<?php
   mysqli_report(MYSQLI_REPORT_OFF);
   
   $conn = mysqli_connect("localhost", "root", "", "fresherearth");
   
   if(mysqli_connect_error())
   {
      echo "Connection to the database failed!<BR>";
      echo "Reason: ", mysqli_connect_error();
      exit();
   }
   
   $sqlCode = "CREATE TABLE student (
      id INT(6) UNSIGNED AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
      name VARCHAR(30) NOT NULL,
      age INT(2),
      email VARCHAR(40) NOT NULL
   )";
   
   if(mysqli_query($conn, $sqlCode))
   {
      echo "Table has been created successfully.";
      // block of code to process further
   }
   else
   {
      echo "Table has not been created!<BR>";
      echo "Reason: ", mysqli_error($conn);
   }
   
   mysqli_close($conn);
?>

Note - The mysqli_report() is used to modify the error reporting mode, in procedural style.

Note - The mysqli_connect() is used to open a connection to the MySQL database server, in procedural style.

Note - The mysqli_connect_errno() is used to get/return the error code (if any) from last connect call, in procedural style.

Note - The mysqli_connect_error() is used to return the error description (if any) from the last connection, in procedural style.

Note - The mysqli_query() is used to perform query on the MySQL database, in procedural style.

Note - The mysqli_error() is used to return the description of error (if any), by the most recent function call, in object-oriented style.

Note - The mysqli_close() is used to close an opened connection to the MySQL database, in procedural style.

PHP MySQL - Create Table Manually

We can also create a table manually. As already mentioned, that I am using XAMPP for this PHP MySQL series. Therefore, follow these steps to create a MySQL table manually, without any PHP script.

Step No.1: Open XAMPP

Step No.2: Click on the Start, next to Apache

Step No.3: Click on the Start, next to MySQL

Step No.4: Click on the Admin, next MySQL

Step No.5: Click on the Databases

Step No.6: Select/Click on the Database say fresherearth

Step No.7: Type the name of the table say client and type the number of columns to insert in the table say 4. Here is the snapshot:

Step No.8: Now click on the Go link/button. Here is the snapshot of the new window:

Step No.9: Now fill the details of all the four columns, and then click on the Save to create the table. That is it.

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