PHP-Impersonate

A PHP library for making HTTP requests with browser impersonation. This library uses curl-impersonate to mimic various browsers' network signatures, making it useful for accessing websites that may detect and block automated requests.

Installation

Install via Composer:

composer require hamaadraza/php-impersonate

System Requirements

• PHP 8.0 or higher

Basic Usage

<?php
require 'vendor/autoload.php';

use Raza\PHPImpersonate\PHPImpersonate;

// Simple GET request
$response = PHPImpersonate::get('https://example.com');
echo $response->body();

// POST request with data
$response = PHPImpersonate::post('https://example.com/api', [
    'username' => 'johndoe',
    'email' => 'john@example.com'
]);

// Check the response
if ($response->isSuccess()) {
    $data = $response->json();
    echo "User created with ID: " . $data['id'];
} else {
    echo "Error: " . $response->status();
}

API Reference

Static Methods

The library provides convenient static methods for making requests:

// GET request with optional headers and timeout
PHPImpersonate::get(string $url, array $headers = [], int $timeout = 30): Response

// POST request with optional data, headers and timeout
PHPImpersonate::post(string $url, ?array $data = null, array $headers = [], int $timeout = 30): Response

// PUT request with optional data, headers and timeout
PHPImpersonate::put(string $url, ?array $data = null, array $headers = [], int $timeout = 30): Response

// PATCH request with optional data, headers and timeout 
PHPImpersonate::patch(string $url, ?array $data = null, array $headers = [], int $timeout = 30): Response

// DELETE request with optional headers and timeout
PHPImpersonate::delete(string $url, array $headers = [], int $timeout = 30): Response

// HEAD request with optional headers and timeout
PHPImpersonate::head(string $url, array $headers = [], int $timeout = 30): Response

Instance Methods

You can also create an instance of the client for more configuration options:

// Create a client with specific browser and timeout
$client = new PHPImpersonate('chrome107', 30);

// Instance methods
$client->sendGet(string $url, array $headers = []): Response
$client->sendPost(string $url, ?array $data = null, array $headers = []): Response
$client->sendPut(string $url, ?array $data = null, array $headers = []): Response
$client->sendPatch(string $url, ?array $data = null, array $headers = []): Response
$client->sendDelete(string $url, array $headers = []): Response
$client->sendHead(string $url, array $headers = []): Response

// Generic send method
$client->send(Request $request): Response

Response Methods

The Response class provides several methods for working with HTTP responses:

// Get the HTTP status code
$response->status(): int

// Get the response body as string
$response->body(): string

// Check if the response was successful (status code 200-299)
$response->isSuccess(): bool

// Parse the response body as JSON (throws \JsonException on failure)
$response->json(bool $associative = true, int $depth = 512, int $flags = 0): mixed

// Check whether a header is present (case-insensitive)
$response->hasHeader(string $name): bool

// Get the first value of a header (case-insensitive), or $default when absent
$response->header(string $name, ?string $default = null): ?string

// Get ALL values of a header — use this for Set-Cookie and other repeatable headers
$response->headerAll(string $name): string[]

// Get all headers as a map of name → list of values
$response->headers(): array<string, string[]>

// Serialise to a plain array
$response->toArray(): array

// Dump response details to a string (for logging)
$response->dump(): string

// Print response details and return self (for debugging)
$response->debug(): Response

Working with Headers

Most headers have a single value, so header() is all you need:

$contentType = $response->header('Content-Type');         // 'application/json'
$etag        = $response->header('ETag', 'none');         // fallback to 'none'

if ($response->hasHeader('X-Rate-Limit-Remaining')) {
    $remaining = $response->header('X-Rate-Limit-Remaining');
}

Some headers are legitimately repeated by the server — most commonly Set-Cookie. Per RFC 6265 §4.1.1, cookie values must not be folded into a single comma-separated string, so header('Set-Cookie') would silently drop all but the first cookie. Use headerAll() instead:

$cookies = $response->headerAll('Set-Cookie');
// ['sessionid=abc; Path=/; HttpOnly', 'csrftoken=xyz; Path=/; SameSite=Lax']

foreach ($cookies as $cookie) {
    echo $cookie . "\n";
}

headers() returns the full map when you need to inspect everything at once:

$allHeaders = $response->headers();
// [
//     'Content-Type' => ['application/json'],
//     'Set-Cookie'   => ['sessionid=abc; Path=/; HttpOnly', 'csrftoken=xyz; Path=/'],
//     'Cache-Control'=> ['no-cache, no-store'],
// ]

foreach ($response->headers() as $name => $values) {
    // $values is always an array, even for single-value headers
    foreach ($values as $value) {
        echo "$name: $value\n";
    }
}

Key point: Each header name maps to an array of values (string[]), not a single string. This correctly handles HTTP responses where headers like Set-Cookie can appear multiple times.

Browser Options

PHP-Impersonate supports mimicking various browsers:

• chrome99_android (default)
• chrome99
• chrome100
• chrome101
• chrome104
• chrome107
• chrome110
• chrome116
• chrome119
• chrome120
• chrome123
• chrome124
• chrome131
• chrome131_android
• chrome133a
• chrome136
• edge99
• edge101
• firefox133
• firefox135
• safari153
• safari155
• safari170
• safari172_ios
• safari180
• safari180_ios
• safari184
• safari184_ios
• safari260
• safari260_ios
• tor145

Example:

// Create a client that mimics Firefox
$client = new PHPImpersonate('firefox135');
$response = $client->sendGet('https://example.com');

Timeouts

You can configure request timeouts:

// Set a 5-second timeout for this request
$response = PHPImpersonate::get('https://example.com', [], 5);

// Or when creating a client instance
$client = new PHPImpersonate('chrome107', 10); // 10-second timeout

Proxy Configuration

You can route requests through a proxy server using the curlOptions parameter:

Basic Proxy Usage

use Raza\PHPImpersonate\PHPImpersonate;

$client = new PHPImpersonate(
    browser: 'chrome136',
    timeout: 30,
    curlOptions: [
        'proxy' => 'http://127.0.0.1:8080',  // HTTP proxy
        'proxy-user' => 'user:password',    // optional authentication
    ]
);

$response = $client->sendGet('https://api.ipify.org?format=json');

echo $response->body();

Proxy Options

The following proxy-related curl options are supported:

Option	Description	Example
proxy	Proxy server address	'http://127.0.0.1:8080' or 'http://proxy.example.com:3128'
proxy-user	Proxy authentication credentials	'username:password'

SOCKS Proxy

You can also use SOCKS proxies by specifying the protocol:

$client = new PHPImpersonate(
    browser: 'chrome136',
    timeout: 30,
    curlOptions: [
        'proxy' => 'socks5://127.0.0.1:1080',    // SOCKS5 proxy
    ]
);

Using Proxy with Static Methods

For one-off requests with a proxy, create an instance and use the instance methods:

$client = new PHPImpersonate(
    browser: 'chrome136',
    timeout: 30,
    curlOptions: [
        'proxy' => 'http://proxy.example.com:8080',
        'proxy-user' => 'user:pass',
    ]
);

// GET request through proxy
$response = $client->sendGet('https://example.com');

// POST request through proxy
$response = $client->sendPost('https://example.com/api', [
    'key' => 'value'
]);

Advanced Examples

JSON API Request

// Data will be automatically converted to JSON with correct Content-Type
$data = [
    'title' => 'New Post',
    'body' => 'This is the content',
    'userId' => 1
];

$response = PHPImpersonate::post(
    'https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/posts',
    $data,
    ['Content-Type' => 'application/json']
);

$post = $response->json();
echo "Created post with ID: {$post['id']}\n";

Error Handling

try {
    $response = PHPImpersonate::get('https://example.com/nonexistent', [], 5);
    
    if (!$response->isSuccess()) {
        echo "Error: HTTP {$response->status()}\n";
        echo $response->body();
    }
} catch (\Raza\PHPImpersonate\Exception\RequestException $e) {
    echo "Request failed: " . $e->getMessage();
}

Data Formats for POST, PUT and PATCH Requests

PHP-Impersonate supports sending data in different formats:

Form Data

By default, data is sent as form data (application/x-www-form-urlencoded):

// This will be sent as form data
$response = PHPImpersonate::post('https://example.com/api', [
    'username' => 'johndoe',
    'email' => 'john@example.com'
]);

// Explicitly specify form data
$response = PHPImpersonate::post('https://example.com/api',
    [
        'username' => 'johndoe',
        'email' => 'john@example.com'
    ],
    ['Content-Type' => 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded']
);

JSON Data

You can send data as JSON by specifying the Content-Type header:

// Send data as JSON
$response = PHPImpersonate::post('https://example.com/api',
    [
        'username' => 'johndoe',
        'email' => 'john@example.com'
    ],
    ['Content-Type' => 'application/json']
);

For PUT and PATCH requests, JSON is used as the default format.

Testing

Run the test suite:

composer test

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.