Detecting image type from base64 string in PHP

Question

Is it possible to find out the type of an image encoded as a base64 String in PHP?

I have no method of accessing the original image file, just the encoded string. From what I've seen, imagecreatefromstring() can create an image resource from a string representation (after it's been decoded from base64), but it automatically detects the image type and the image resource itself is a special PHP representation. In case I want to save the image as a file again, I would have no idea if the type I am saving it as corresponds to the original type from which the String representation was created.

Upsetting

There is a duplicate somewhere, but I don't know where. – Meiny

Answer 1

FileInfo can do that for you:

$encoded_string = "....";
$imgdata = base64_decode($encoded_string);

$f = finfo_open();

$mime_type = finfo_buffer($f, $imgdata, FILEINFO_MIME_TYPE);

Roussillon

Nice, and presumably as reliable as getimagesize(). +1 – Meiny

Not sure what getimagesize uses internally, but one would hope so. – Roussillon

Yeah, but I'm not sure what engine getimagesize uses to pick out the magic numbers. FileInfo depends on the external system mime database and can handle any file type. GIS could be using some hardcoded magic numbers and only look for those specifically. – Roussillon

@MarcB I'm fairly sure getimagesize is hard-coded. It gets a lot of additional information from the headers. – Meiny

getimagesize requires to save stuff though – Retinue

its very help full when your want to save file in database. easily you get mimetype and set header for viewing file for user. – Baecher

This prints out "application/octet-stream" I'm looking to see if the file is jpg, png, gif. – Gehrke

If you want to use this mimeType to find a file extension, see https://mcmap.net/q/213324/-convert-mime-type-to-file-extension-php – Tensiometer

Answer 2

If you dont want to use these functions because of their dependencies you can use the first bytes of the data:

function getBytesFromHexString($hexdata)
{
  for($count = 0; $count < strlen($hexdata); $count+=2)
    $bytes[] = chr(hexdec(substr($hexdata, $count, 2)));
    
  return implode($bytes);
}

function getImageMimeType($imagedata)
{
  $imagemimetypes = array( 
    "jpeg" => "FFD8", 
    "png" => "89504E470D0A1A0A", 
    "gif" => "474946",
    "bmp" => "424D", 
    "tiff" => "4949",
    "tiff" => "4D4D"
  );
 
  foreach ($imagemimetypes as $mime => $hexbytes)
  {
    $bytes = getBytesFromHexString($hexbytes);
    if (substr($imagedata, 0, strlen($bytes)) == $bytes)
      return $mime;
  }
  
  return NULL;
}

$encoded_string = "....";
$imgdata = base64_decode($encoded_string);
$mimetype = getImageMimeType($imgdata);

---

references :- check here the list of file signatures

Irreligious

Storing them as byte values (\xFF\xD8 for example) means you can just do a string comparision. – Bathtub

thankyou it works. For some who uses codeigniter don't forget to add $this-> in every called functions. – Photofluorography

Answer 3

The solution given by @Marc B is the best one for me (if our php version is > 5.3.0 otherwise we can use the solution given by @Aaron Murgatroyd).

I would like to give a little addition to this solution.

To get the image type you can do it like this :

$split = explode( '/', $mime_type );
$type = $split[1]; 

In fact, (if you don't know it) the mime type for images is : image/type and type can be png or gif or jpeg or ...

Hope that can help someone and thanks to @Marc B for his solution.

For an exhaustive list of mime type you can look here :

• http://www.sitepoint.com/web-foundations/mime-types-complete-list/

Rabinowitz

Answer 4

Code below will get the image type from its mime type.

<?php 
$base64 = "data:image/png;base64,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";

$image_info = getimagesize($base64);

$extension = (isset($image_info["mime"]) ? explode('/', $image_info["mime"] )[1]: "");

echo $extension;
 
?>

Fingerstall

Answer 5

The way shown by @Marc B is the nicest.

Should FInfo not be available, the only other way I know is to store the data into a file, and run a getimagesize() on it.

Meiny

Answer 6

If you know a minimal amount about the file format structure, you could theoretically look at the top bytes of the file until you could work out what type of file it is.

For example, a GIF image always starts with the following bytes GIF89a. If you can find that string at the begining of the file, you can be reasonably sure that it is a GIF image and absolutely certain it isn't any other image format. (it could still be a text file though, that just happens to start with 'GIF89a'; you'd have to parse more of the file to be absolutely certain)

Likewise, PNG files have the string PNG fairly near the start (it's not quite at the very begining; again, you'd need to research the file format specifics to help you determine how much you'd need to know to be certain).

JPEGs also contain recognisable strings in their headers, although these are more varied and complex. You might want to look out for the string Exif.

Getting the file format definitions would definitely give you more accuracy, but depending on how accurate you need to be, you might learn enough about the files formats just by opening some image files in a binary editor to see how they're structured.

These resources may help you:

• http://www.w3.org/Graphics/JPEG/

• http://www.w3.org/Graphics/PNG/

Africa

Answer 7

You can use magic numbers to detect a MIME type (check here the list of file signatures). However, file signatures are not 100% reliable and you can easily encounter false positives. Of course, there are tasks when a such solution is more than enough.

So if you have a Base64 string and want to identify its MIME type using file signatures you don't need to decode the Base64. A much faster way is to store the file signatures as Base64 and just check if input starts with one of them. A simple example:

<?php 

function detectMimeType(string $base64) 
{
    $signaturesForBase64 = [
        'JVBERi0'     => "application/pdf",
        'R0lGODdh'    => "image/gif",
        'R0lGODlh'    => "image/gif",
        'iVBORw0KGgo' => "image/png",
        '/9j/'        => "image/jpeg"
    ];
    
    foreach($signaturesForBase64 as $sign => $mimeType) 
    {
        if(strpos($base64, $sign) === 0) {
            return $mimeType;
        }
    }

    return false;
}

var_dump(detectMimeType('R0lGODdhAQABAPAAAP8AAAAAACwAAAAAAQABAAACAkQBADs=')); // image/gif
var_dump(detectMimeType('iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAEAAAABCAIAAACQd1PeAAAADElEQVR42mP4z8AAAAMBAQD3A0FDAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC')); // image/png
var_dump(detectMimeType('JVBERi0xLjUKJYCBgoMKMSAwIG9iago8PC9GaWx0ZXIvRmxhdGVEZWNvZGUvRmlyc3QgMTQxL04gMjAvTGVuZ3')); // application/pdf
var_dump(detectMimeType('/9j/4AAQSkZJRgABAQAAZABkAAD/2wCEABQQEBkSGScXFycyJh8mMi4mJiYmLj41NTU1NT5EQUFBQUFBRERERERERERE')); // image/jpeg

I got this solution from this Js Que-Answer

---

Additinally : this one is also works properly

Smelt

you can test this code online at onlinephp.io just copy above code & paste it than run it to see output – Smelt

Answer 8

Follow PHP.NET Fileinfo :-

$finfo = finfo_open(FILEINFO_MIME_TYPE); // return mime type ala mimetype extension
foreach (glob("*") as $filename) {
echo finfo_file($finfo, $filename) . "\n";
}
finfo_close($finfo);

Annabel