How to create a random string using PHP?

Question

I know that the rand function in PHP generates random integers, but what is the best way to generate a random string such as:

Original string, 9 chars

$string = 'abcdefghi';

Example random string limiting to 6 chars

$string = 'ibfeca';

UPDATE: I have found tons of these types of functions, basically I'm trying to understand the logic behind each step.

UPDATE: The function should generate any amount of chars as required.

Please comment the parts if you reply.

Answer 1

well, I was looking for a solution, and I kindda used @Chad Birch's solution merged with @Gumbo's one. This is what I came up with:

function get_random_string($length, $valid_chars = "ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz123456790!·$%&/()=?¿¡',.-;:+*`+´ç")
{
    $random_string = "";
    $num_valid_chars = strlen($valid_chars);
    for ($i = 0; $i < $length; $i++, $random_string .= $valid_chars[mt_rand(1, $num_valid_chars)-1]);
    return $random_string;
}

I think comments are pretty much unnecesary since the answers I used to build up this one are already thoroughly commented. Cheers!

Answer 2

Joining characters at the end should be more efficient that repeated string concatenation.

Edit #1: Added option to avoid character repetition.

Edit #2: Throws exception to avoid getting into infinite loop if $norepeat is selected and $len is greater than the charset to pick from.

Edit #3: Uses array keys to store picked random characters when $norepeat is selected, as associative array key lookup is faster than linearly searching the array.

function rand_str($len, $norepeat = true)
{
    $chars = "abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ0123456789";
    $max = strlen($chars) - 1;

    if ($norepeat && len > $max + 1) {
        throw new Exception("Non repetitive random string can't be longer than charset");
    }

    $rand_chars = array();

    while ($len) {
        $picked = $chars[mt_rand(0, $max)];

        if ($norepeat) {
            if (!array_key_exists($picked, $rand_chars)) {
                $rand_chars[$picked] = true;
                $len--;
            }
        }
        else {
            $rand_chars[] = $picked;
            $len--;
        }
    }

    return implode('', $norepeat ? array_keys($rand_chars) : $rand_chars);   
}

Answer 3

This builds on Gumbo's solution by adding functionality to list a set of characters to be skipped in the base character set. The random string selects characters from $base_charset which do not also appear in $skip_charset.

/* Make a random string of length using characters from $charset, excluding $skip_chars.
 * @param length (integer) length of return value
 * @param skip_chars (string) characters to be excluded from $charset
 * @param charset (string) characters of posibilities for characters in return val
 * @return (string) random string of length $length    */
function rand_string(
        $length, 
        $skip_charset = '', 
        $base_charset='ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789'){
  $skip_len = strlen($skip_charset);
  for ($i = 0; $i<$skip_len; $i++){
    $base_charset = str_replace($skip_charset[$i], '', $base_charset);
  }
  cvar_dump($base_charset, '$base_charset after replace');
  $str = '';
  $count = strlen($base_charset);
  while ($length--) {
    $str .= $base_charset[mt_rand(0, $count - 1)];
  }
  return $str;
}

Here are some usage examples. The first two examples use the default value for $base_charset. The last example explicitly defines $base_charset.

echo rand_string(15, 'ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz');
//  470620078953298
echo rand_string(8, 'abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789');
//  UKLIHOTFSUZMFPU
echo rand_string(15, 'def', 'abcdef');
//  cbcbbccbabccaba

Answer 4

What do you need a random string for?

Is this going to be used for anything remotely analogous to a password?

If your random string requires any security properties at all, you should use PHP 7's random_int() function instead of all the insecure mt_rand() answers in this thread.

/**
 * Generate a random string
 * 
 * @link https://paragonie.com/b/JvICXzh_jhLyt4y3
 *
 * @param int $length - How long should our random string be?
 * @param string $charset - A string of all possible characters to choose from
 * @return string
 */
function random_str($length = 32, $charset = 'abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz')
{
    // Type checks:
    if (!is_numeric($length)) {
        throw new InvalidArgumentException(
            'random_str - Argument 1 - expected an integer'
        );
    }
    if (!is_string($charset)) {
        throw new InvalidArgumentException(
            'random_str - Argument 2 - expected a string'
        );
    }

    if ($length < 1) {
        // Just return an empty string. Any value < 1 is meaningless.
        return '';
    }
    // This is the maximum index for all of the characters in the string $charset
    $charset_max = strlen($charset) - 1;
    if ($charset_max < 1) {
        // Avoid letting users do: random_str($int, 'a'); -> 'aaaaa...'
        throw new LogicException(
            'random_str - Argument 2 - expected a string at least 2 characters long'
        );
    }
    // Now that we have good data, this is the meat of our function:
    $random_str = '';
    for ($i = 0; $i < $length; ++$i) {
        $r = random_int(0, $charset_max);
        $random_str .= $charset[$r];
    }
    return $random_str;
}

If you aren't on PHP 7 yet (which is probably the case, as it hasn't been released as of this writing), then you'll want paragonie/random_compat, which is a userland implementation of random_bytes() and random_int() for PHP 5 projects.

For security contexts, always use random_int(), not rand(), mt_rand(), etc. See ircmaxell's answer as well.

Answer 5

So, let me start off by saying USE A LIBRARY. Many exist:

• RandomCompat
• RandomLib
• SecurityMultiTool

The core of the problem is almost every answer in this page is susceptible to attack. mt_rand(), rand(), lcg_value() and uniqid() are all vulnerable to attack.

A good system will use /dev/urandom from the filesystem, or mcrypt_create_iv() (with MCRYPT_DEV_URANDOM) or openssl_pseudo_random_bytes(). Which all of the above do. PHP 7 will come with two new functions random_bytes($len) and random_int($min, $max) that are also safe.

Be aware that most of those functions (except random_int()) return "raw strings" meaning they can contain any ASCII character from 0 - 255. If you want a printable string, I'd suggest running the result through base64_encode().