PHP allows you to easily read your file contents into an array or a string. To read into a string, use file_get_contents() function. To read into an array, use file() function. The file function would copy each line of content into a different array element.

Grocery List

bread
eggs
milk

grocery_list.txt

PHP code

file() returns contents of file as array
file_get_contents() returns contents of file as string
Array ( [0] => bread [1] => eggs [2] => milk )
bread eggs milk 

<?php
    $afile = file('grocery_list.txt');
    $sfile = file_get_contents('grocery_list.txt');
    print '<br>file() returns contents of file as ' . gettype($afile);
    print '<br>file_get_contents() returns contents of file as ' . gettype($sfile);
    print '<br>';
    print_r($afile);
    print '<br>';
    print_r($sfile);
?>

grocery_list.php

Output

file() returns contents of file as array
file_get_contents() returns contents of file as string
Array ( [0] => bread [1] => eggs [2] => milk )
bread eggs milk