How to do this in 2017:
spl_autoload_register( function ($class_name) {
$CLASSES_DIR = __DIR__ . DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR . 'classes' . DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR; // or whatever your directory is
$file = $CLASSES_DIR . $class_name . '.php';
if( file_exists( $file ) ) include $file; // only include if file exists, otherwise we might enter some conflicts with other pieces of code which are also using the spl_autoload_register function
} );
Recommended by PHP documentation here: Autoloading classes