SimpleXMLElement->xpath() Runs XPath query on XML data SimpleXMLElement arrayxpath stringpath The xpath method searches the SimpleXML node for children matching the XPath path. It always returns an array of SimpleXMLElement objects. text stuff code XML; $xml = new SimpleXMLElement($string); /* Search for */ $result = $xml->xpath('/a/b/c'); while(list( , $node) = each($result)) { echo '/a/b/c: ',$node,"\n"; } /* Relative paths also work... */ $result = $xml->xpath('b/c'); while(list( , $node) = each($result)) { echo 'b/c: ',$node,"\n"; } ?> ]]> This script will display: Notice that the two results are equal.