The best way to store &(Ampersand) in MySQL database

Question

I\'m building a category list and I\'m unsure how to store the Ampersand symbol in MySQL database. Is there any problem/disadvantage if I use \'&\'. Are the

Answer 1

We store '&' into database fields all the time, it's fine to do so (at-least I've never heard an argument otherwise).

If you're only ever using the string in a HTML page you could just store the HTML safe & version I suppose. I would suggest that storing '&' and escaping it when you read it would be better though (in-case you need to use the string in a non-HTML context in the future).