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curl_error

(PHP 4 >= 4.0.3, PHP 5, PHP 7, PHP 8)

curl_errorReturn a string containing the last error for the current session

Description

curl_error(CurlHandle $handle): string

Returns a clear text error message for the last cURL operation.

Parameters

handle

A cURL handle returned by curl_init().

Return Values

Returns the error message or '' (the empty string) if no error occurred.

Changelog

Version Description
8.0.0 handle expects a CurlHandle instance now; previously, a resource was expected.

Examples

Example #1 curl_error() example

<?php
// Create a curl handle to a non-existing location
$ch = curl_init('http://404.php.net/');
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);

if(
curl_exec($ch) === false)
{
echo
'Curl error: ' . curl_error($ch);
}
else
{
echo
'Operation completed without any errors';
}

// Close handle
curl_close($ch);
?>

See Also

add a note

User Contributed Notes 4 notes

up
64
patrick at ibuildings dot nl
11 years ago
If you want to fetch the error message, make sure you fetch it before you close the current cURL session or the error message will be reset to an empty string.
up
28
paul at paulmcgarry dot com
16 years ago
For a 404 response to actually trigger an error as the example seems to be trying to demonstrate the following option should be set:

curl_setopt($ch,CURLOPT_FAILONERROR,true);

As per http://curl.haxx.se/libcurl/c/libcurl-errors.html

CURLE_HTTP_RETURNED_ERROR (22)
This is returned if CURLOPT_FAILONERROR is set TRUE and the HTTP server returns an error code that is >= 400. (This error code was formerly known as CURLE_HTTP_NOT_FOUND.)
up
8
Anonymous
3 years ago
If you're using curl_multi and there's an error, curl_error() will remain empty until you've called curl_multi_info_read(). That function "pumps" the information inside the curl libraries to the point where curl_error() will return a useful string.

This should really be added to the documentation, because it's not at all obvious.
up
7
anrdaemon at freemail dot ru
5 years ago
curl_error is not a textual representation of curl_errno.
It's an actual error *message*.
If you want textual representation of error *code*, look for curl_strerror.
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