Is it possible to delete an object's property in PHP?

If I have an stdObject say, $a.

Sure there's no problem to assign a new property, $a,

$a->new_property = $xyz;

But then I want to remove it, so unset is of no help here.

So,

$a->new_property = null;

is kind of it. But is there a more 'elegant' way?

unset($a->new_property);

This works for array elements, variables, and object attributes.

Example:

$a = new stdClass();
   
$a->new_property = 'foo';
var_export($a);  // -> stdClass::__set_state(array('new_property' => 'foo'))
   
unset($a->new_property);
var_export($a);  // -> stdClass::__set_state(array())

This also works specially if you are looping over an object.

unset($object[$key])

Update

Newer versions of PHP throw fatal error Fatal error: Cannot use object of type Object as array as mentioned by @CXJ . In that case you can use brackets instead

unset($object->{$key})

This also works if you are looping over an object.

unset($object->$key);

No need to use brackets.

This code is working fine for me in a loop

$remove = array(
	"market_value",
	"sector_id"
);

foreach($remove as $key){
	unset($obj_name->$key);
}

Set an element to null just set the value of the element to null the element still exists

unset an element means remove the element it works for array, stdClass objects user defined classes and also for any variable

<?php
    $a = new stdClass();
    $a->one = 1;
    $a->two = 2;
    var_export($a);
    unset($a->one);
    var_export($a);
    
    class myClass
    {
        public $one = 1;
        public $two = 2;
    }
    
    $instance = new myClass();
    var_export($instance);
    unset($instance->one);
    var_export($instance);
    
    $anyvariable = 'anyValue';
    var_export($anyvariable);
    unset($anyvariable);
    var_export($anyvariable);