PHP Prepared Statements - MySQL Check if user exists - php

Question

I don't know why my code doesn't seem to be working. I want to check if an email exists in the database, and if it doesn't exist proceed with registration. Here's the code:
if (empty($errors)) { //Using Prepared Statements
// Connect to the database:
$dbc = mysqli_connect ('localhost','root', 'pass', 'book_store');
$q = "SELECT user_id FROM users WHERE email=?";
$stmt = mysqli_prepare($dbc, $q);
mysqli_stmt_bind_param($stmt, 'i', $email);
mysqli_stmt_execute($stmt);
$result = mysqli_stmt_get_result($stmt);
$num_rows = mysqli_num_rows($result);
if ($num_rows == 0) { //Check if email exists
$q = 'INSERT INTO users(first_name, last_name, state, email) VALUES (?, ?, ?, ?)';
$stmt = mysqli_prepare($dbc, $q);
mysqli_stmt_bind_param($stmt,'ssss', $fn, $ln,$state, $email);
mysqli_stmt_execute($stmt);
// Closee statement:
mysqli_stmt_close($stmt);
// Close the connection:
mysqli_close($dbc);
} else {
echo '<h1>email exists</h1>';
}
}
else {
echo '<p>The Errors Occurred:<br />';
foreach ($errors as $msg) {
echo " - $msg<br />\n";
}
echo '</p><p>Please Try Again.</p>';
}
}

Answer 1

You have given i, which represents variable of type int. Try replacing that with s as given below.
$q = "SELECT user_id FROM users WHERE email=?";
$stmt = mysqli_prepare($dbc, $q);
mysqli_stmt_bind_param($stmt, 's', $email);