# from_charset

`from_charset` is used to transcode a string from a given charset to the
internal charset. This is the exact opposite of the [to_charset
modifier](language-modifier-to-charset.md).

## Parameters

| Parameter Position | Type   | Required | Possible Values                                                                                                              | Default      | Description                                                   |
|--------------------|--------|----------|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|--------------|---------------------------------------------------------------|
| 1                  | string | No       | `ISO-8859-1`, `UTF-8`, and any character set supported by [`mb_convert_encoding()`](https://www.php.net/mb_convert_encoding) | `ISO-8859-1` | The charset encoding the value is supposed to be decoded from |

> **Note**
>
> Charset encoding should be handled by the application itself. This
> modifier should only be used in cases where the application cannot
> anticipate that a certain string is required in another encoding.

See also [Configuring Smarty](../../api/configuring.md), [to_charset
modifier](language-modifier-to-charset.md).
