php strlen shows different length of array elements

Question

I am having a problem. I have a string in a variable. I split the string in to an array using explode function. But strlen function shows different lengths when I echo the string as an array element and echo the same string in strlen function. Below is my code

 echo $schedule = 'Early Evening 6pm-9pm Tuesday, Early Evening 6pm-9pm Wednesday';
    $scr = explode(",",$schedule);
    $sc = array_map('trim', $scr);
    print_r($sc);
    echo strlen($sc[0]);
    echo $sc[0];
    echo '<br />';
    echo 'string "Early Evening 6pm-9pm Tuesday" has '.strlen('Early Evening 6pm-9pm Tuesday'). ' chars<br />';
if(in_array('Early Evening 6pm-9pm Tuesday', $sc)){ echo 'yes'; } else { echo 'no'; }

and here is output:

        Early Evening 6pm-9pm Tuesday, Early Evening 6pm-9pm Wednesday

        Array ( [0] =>
        Early Evening 6pm-9pm Tuesday [1] => Early Evening 6pm-9pm Wednesday

        ) 
    151 //length of first element of array
        Early Evening 6pm-9pm Tuesday //first element of an array
        string "Early Evening 6pm-9pm Tuesday" has 29 chars
no //I need yes here

Answer 1

I think your string contains HTML tags that you just don't see in your browser.

Try adding

$sc = array_map('htmlspecialchars', $scr);

after your third line to make them visible, or view page source of your output.