MRZ (Machine Readable Zones) Parser for PHP

A PHP package for MRZ (Machine Readable Zones) code parser for Passport, Visa & Travel Document (TD1 & TD2).

It reads the machine-readable zone, extracts the document fields, and — new in v2 — verifies the ICAO 9303 check digits so you can tell whether the data is internally consistent.

Requirements

• PHP 8.2 or higher

Installation

You can install the package via composer:

composer require rakibdevs/mrz-parser

Usage

use Rakibdevs\MrzParser\MrzParser;
.....
.....
$data = MrzParser::parse('P<UTOERIKSSON<<ANNA<MARIA<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
L898902C36UTO7408122F1204159ZE184226B<<<<<10');

var_dump($data);

Output

{
    "type": "Passport",
    "card_no": "L898902C3",
    "issuer": "Utopian",
    "issuer_code": "UTO",
    "date_of_expiry": "2012-04-15",
    "first_name": "ANNA MARIA",
    "last_name": "ERIKSSON",
    "date_of_birth": "1974-08-12",
    "gender": "Female",
    "sex": "F",
    "personal_number": "ZE184226B",
    "optional_data": "ZE184226B",
    "nationality": "Utopian",
    "nationality_code": "UTO",
    "valid": true,
    "validation": {
        "card_no": true,
        "date_of_birth": true,
        "date_of_expiry": true,
        "personal_number": true,
        "composite": true
    },
    "raw": "P<UTOERIKSSON<<ANNA<MARIA<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<\nL898902C36UTO7408122F1204159ZE184226B<<<<<10"
}

Check-digit validation

Every result carries a valid flag (overall) and a validation map with the outcome of each ICAO 9303 check digit (card_no, date_of_birth, date_of_expiry, personal_number for passports, and the composite). Visas carry no composite check digit, so their validation map omits it. Use these to reject OCR mistakes or tampered documents.

Input handling

Input is normalized before parsing: \r\n / \r line endings are converted to \n, surrounding whitespace is trimmed, and blank lines are dropped — so MRZ strings copied from Windows or OCR output parse the same as clean input. Dates are validated strictly (impossible dates such as Feb 30 return null), and a date of birth that would resolve to the future is shifted back a century.

Advanced usage

Typed result object

read() returns an MrzResult value object with typed properties and helpers, while toArray() gives you the same array as parse():

$mrz = MrzParser::read($text);

$mrz->cardNo;                    // 'L898902C3'
$mrz->fullName();                // 'ANNA MARIA ERIKSSON'
$mrz->dateOfBirthAsDate();       // DateTimeImmutable
$mrz->isExpired();               // bool (or null when the format has no expiry)
$mrz->valid;                     // bool
$mrz->toArray();                 // the canonical parse() array

Non-throwing parsing

parse()/read() throw on unrecognised input. Use the try* variants to get null instead:

MrzParser::tryParse($text);      // ?array
MrzParser::tryRead($text);       // ?MrzResult

Strict check-digit mode

Pass strict: true to reject documents whose check digits don't verify (throws InvalidChecksumException; the try* variants return null):

MrzParser::parse($text, strict: true);
MrzParser::read($text, strict: true);

Name transliteration

The MRZ name field only holds A–Z. Convert a visual-zone (accented) name to its MRZ form, or compare the two:

use Rakibdevs\MrzParser\Support\Transliterator;

Transliterator::fromLatin('Müller');            // 'MUELLER'
Transliterator::fromLatin('Jørgensen');         // 'JOERGENSEN'
Transliterator::matches('MUELLER', 'Müller');   // true

Laravel

The package ships an auto-discovered service provider and a validation rule (requires illuminate/support):

use Rakibdevs\MrzParser\Laravel\Rules\ValidMrz;

$request->validate([
    'mrz' => [new ValidMrz()],              // must be a parseable MRZ
    'mrz' => [new ValidMrz(strict: true)],  // ...with valid check digits
]);

Supported Document

Passport (TD3)

P<UTOERIKSSON<<ANNA<MARIA<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
L898902C36UTO7408122F1204159ZE184226B<<<<<10

Visa

V<UTOERIKSSON<<ANNA<MARIA<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
L8988901C4XXX7408122F96121096ZE184226B<<<<<<

Or

V<UTOERIKSSON<<ANNA<MARIA<<<<<<<<<<<
L8988901C4XXX7408122F9612109<<<<<<<<

Travel Document (TD1)

I<UTOD231458907<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
7408122F1204159UTO<<<<<<<<<<<6
ERIKSSON<<ANNA<MARIA<<<<<<<<<<

Travel Document (TD2)

I<UTOERIKSSON<<ANNA<MARIA<<<<<<<<<<<
D231458907UTO7408122F1204159<<<<<<<6

French National ID (legacy 2×36 Carte Nationale d'Identité)

This pre-2021 format predates ICAO TD1/TD2 and has its own layout (no expiry date is encoded).

IDFRADOUEL<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<932013
0506932020438CHRISTIANE<<NI2906209F3

Changelog

Please see CHANGELOG for more information on what has changed recently.

Contributing

Please see CONTRIBUTING for details.

Security Vulnerabilities

Please review our security policy on how to report security vulnerabilities.

Credits

• Md. Rakibul Islam
• All Contributors

Special thanks to tetrahydra for organised country list, Al Amin for help extracting information.

License

The MIT License (MIT). Please see License File for more information.