How to count emojis only as one character with PHP strlen

If you’re using PHP’s strlen or mb_strlen functions, some emojis will still be counted as multiple characters because of the way that unicode encodes emojis.

Instead, you can use the grapheme_strlen function, which counts all emojis only as one character. It counts a string’s length in “grapheme” units, which are “the smallest functional unit of a writing system.”

PHP documentation for grapheme_strlen can be found here.