这里有两个函数不会引入临时字符串，这在针头很大时可能很有用：

function startsWith($haystack, $needle)
{
    return strncmp($haystack, $needle, strlen($needle)) === 0;
}

function endsWith($haystack, $needle)
{
    return $needle === '' || substr_compare($haystack, $needle, -strlen($needle)) === 0;
}

substr函数在许多特殊情况下都会返回false，所以这里是我的版本，它处理了这些问题：

function startsWith( $haystack, $needle ){
  return $needle === ''.substr( $haystack, 0, strlen( $needle )); // substr's false => empty string
}

function endsWith( $haystack, $needle ){
  $len = strlen( $needle );
  return $needle === ''.substr( $haystack, -$len, $len ); // ! len=0
}

测试（真表示良好）：

var_dump( startsWith('',''));
var_dump( startsWith('1',''));
var_dump(!startsWith('','1'));
var_dump( startsWith('1','1'));
var_dump( startsWith('1234','12'));
var_dump(!startsWith('1234','34'));
var_dump(!startsWith('12','1234'));
var_dump(!startsWith('34','1234'));
var_dump('---');
var_dump( endsWith('',''));
var_dump( endsWith('1',''));
var_dump(!endsWith('','1'));
var_dump( endsWith('1','1'));
var_dump(!endsWith('1234','12'));
var_dump( endsWith('1234','34'));
var_dump(!endsWith('12','1234'));
var_dump(!endsWith('34','1234'));

此外，substra_compare函数也值得一看。http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.substr-compare.php

简而言之：

function startsWith($str, $needle){
   return substr($str, 0, strlen($needle)) === $needle;
}

function endsWith($str, $needle){
   $length = strlen($needle);
   return !$length || substr($str, - $length) === $needle;
}

到目前为止，所有的答案似乎都做了大量不必要的工作、strlen计算、字符串分配（substr）等。“strpos”和“stripos”函数返回$haystack中$needle第一次出现的索引：

function startsWith($haystack,$needle,$case=true)
{
    if ($case)
        return strpos($haystack, $needle, 0) === 0;

    return stripos($haystack, $needle, 0) === 0;
}

function endsWith($haystack,$needle,$case=true)
{
    $expectedPosition = strlen($haystack) - strlen($needle);

    if ($case)
        return strrpos($haystack, $needle, 0) === $expectedPosition;

    return strripos($haystack, $needle, 0) === $expectedPosition;
}

这是一个接受答案的多字节安全版本，它适用于UTF-8字符串：

function startsWith($haystack, $needle)
{
    $length = mb_strlen($needle, 'UTF-8');
    return (mb_substr($haystack, 0, $length, 'UTF-8') === $needle);
}

function endsWith($haystack, $needle)
{
    $length = mb_strlen($needle, 'UTF-8');
    return $length === 0 ||
        (mb_substr($haystack, -$length, $length, 'UTF-8') === $needle);
}

2016年8月23日更新

功能

function substr_startswith($haystack, $needle) {
    return substr($haystack, 0, strlen($needle)) === $needle;
}

function preg_match_startswith($haystack, $needle) {
    return preg_match('~' . preg_quote($needle, '~') . '~A', $haystack) > 0;
}

function substr_compare_startswith($haystack, $needle) {
    return substr_compare($haystack, $needle, 0, strlen($needle)) === 0;
}

function strpos_startswith($haystack, $needle) {
    return strpos($haystack, $needle) === 0;
}

function strncmp_startswith($haystack, $needle) {
    return strncmp($haystack, $needle, strlen($needle)) === 0;
}

function strncmp_startswith2($haystack, $needle) {
    return $haystack[0] === $needle[0]
        ? strncmp($haystack, $needle, strlen($needle)) === 0
        : false;
}

测验

echo 'generating tests';
for($i = 0; $i < 100000; ++$i) {
    if($i % 2500 === 0) echo '.';
    $test_cases[] = [
        random_bytes(random_int(1, 7000)),
        random_bytes(random_int(1, 3000)),
    ];
}
echo "done!\n";


$functions = ['substr_startswith', 'preg_match_startswith', 'substr_compare_startswith', 'strpos_startswith', 'strncmp_startswith', 'strncmp_startswith2'];
$results = [];

foreach($functions as $func) {
    $start = microtime(true);
    foreach($test_cases as $tc) {
        $func(...$tc);
    }
    $results[$func] = (microtime(true) - $start) * 1000;
}

asort($results);

foreach($results as $func => $time) {
    echo "$func: " . number_format($time, 1) . " ms\n";
}

结果（PHP 7.0.9）

（从最快到最慢排序）

strncmp_startswith2: 40.2 ms
strncmp_startswith: 42.9 ms
substr_compare_startswith: 44.5 ms
substr_startswith: 48.4 ms
strpos_startswith: 138.7 ms
preg_match_startswith: 13,152.4 ms

结果（PHP 5.3.29）

（从最快到最慢排序）

strncmp_startswith2: 477.9 ms
strpos_startswith: 522.1 ms
strncmp_startswith: 617.1 ms
substr_compare_startswith: 706.7 ms
substr_startswith: 756.8 ms
preg_match_startswith: 10,200.0 ms

启动基准.php