HEADER<:main>MAIN<:item>ITEM'; // passo 1 $string = preg_replace( '/<.*?>/' , '|' , $string ); // passo 2 $string = preg_replace('/\|+/', '|', $string); // passo 3 $string = array_filter( explode( '|' , $string ) ); print_r( $string );