Count total without duplicate using MySQL and PHP

Question

I am attempting to query a MySQL database with PHP to count the total number of entries without duplicates.

EXAMPLE
N111US
N111US
N123US
N345US
A6-EWD
A7-EEE
B-18701
N123US
N345AA

I wish to have the total number of the unique entries, and I cannot begin to see where to start with the SQL query, that is, Total Returned: 7

Answer 1

This DISTINCT in this query:

SELECT COUNT(DISTINCT `column`) AS `cnt` FROM `table`;

will eliminate duplicates.

Then, from php, fetch the cnt column value the way you would do for any other regular query.