Type Operators

PHP has a single type operator: instanceof. instanceof is used to determine whether a given object is of a specified object class.

The instanceof operator was introduced in PHP 5. Before this time is_a() was used but is_a() has since been deprecated in favor of instanceof.

class A { } class B { } $thing = new A; if ($thing instanceof A) { echo 'A'; } if ($thing instanceof B) { echo 'B'; } ?>

As $thing is an object of type A, but not B, only the block dependent on the A type will be executed:

A

See also get_class() and is_a().