Benefits of PHP. Web Development Projects Highlighted

If you came across this overview by Andersen’s team, you must have googled something like “benefits of php web development.” That is totally understandable. Right now, you might be contemplating a new web development initiative and willing to clarify tech stack-specific issues. Making the eventual decision is a challenging step, as it entails multiple implications and far-reaching consequences.

In today's fast-paced IT market, countless alternatives are available for web development plans. Fresh technologies are emerging constantly. And what they typically promise is swift development with stable, high-performing, and state-of-the-art digital offerings as an outcome. This piece, however, advocates for staying with PHP, a good-old time-tested programming language. In the capacity of a PHP software development company we will try to highlight its benefits. Even though we do realize that PHP might look outdated, this is not so: that is our verdict.

So, if you are asking yourself such questions as “PHP or Python?”, “Does PHP belong to the best FrontEnd web development languages?”, or, say, “What is the list of PHP benefits vs. cons”, check this out.

Benefits of PHP. Web Development Contexts

Just in case, some basics to kick off an informative discussion:

PHP, in the capacity of language to create dynamic and interactive pages, is employed in a myriad of web applications. They range from eCommerce platforms to CRM systems. Initially intended and standing purely for “Personal Home Page” (good-old web 1.0 days), PHP evolved well beyond its original limited scope and early benefits.

There is no shortage of queries and search results looking like “Is PHP dead?” Our reaction: not at all! In spite of its long history (it has been with us since the mid-90s), it still continues to evolve and serve as the foundation of the web-driven world. It is not an exaggeration.

Let’s get briefed on the current landscape by W3Techs. If we take a look at the entirety of web presences whose server-side language is known to us, we will see that PHP remains the key pillar of WWW, with almost 77%.

Zooming in on the ongoing trends, speaking of the IT world as a whole, PHP is the eleventh most applied language among engineers, with 19% making use of it. Finally, such well-known mighty giants as Facebook, Wikipedia, Slack, Spotify, and Wordpress rely on it, while shaping our cyber environment.

Interesting facts: Do not underestimate the power and influence of Wordpress:

Fact 1. WordPress powers 46% of websites worldwide;

Fact 2. WordPress powers the CMS behind 65% of all websites;

Fact 3. WordPress drives 36% of the leading 1 million websites.

These facts speak in favor of PHP advantages.

Web Development Checklist With Benefits

Let’s explore the weighty rationales that might attract one to the potential of PHP to fully exploit it for the best results. Here is a compelling list of PHP web development benefits:

Benefit for web development #1. It serves coders as a free and open-source option. Business means money-making efforts, which implies that unnecessary costs are to be cut. No one wants to end up in a situation when there is a shortage of funds before you deliver your product to its users. From this standpoint, the open-source nature plays into your hands as you don’t pay for a license and no other hidden costs apply.

Benefit for web development #2. It paves way to rapid development and simplified maintenance. IT excels whenever fast-paced prototyping is mandated, due to its simplicity and minimal infrastructure requirements. Changes made by PHP engineers are instantly reflected in the app upon page reload, eliminating the need for recompilation, environment restarts, or other cumbersome and time-consuming manipulations, thereby significantly enhancing development speed.

Benefit for web development #3. It promises you a sufficient range of databases to choose from. It is compatible with every single major platform, be it Linux, macOS, or Windows. With it as your development leverage, you don't have to be concerned about the web server or database you actually have. PHP is supported no matter what. In this sense, it is a bulletproof thing.

Benefit for web development #4. It is a guarantee of efficiency and scalability. Here is an example from our own corporate business and technological practice. At Andersen, skilled PHP specialists craft minimum viable products at the best possible price to test our customers’ concepts. At the same time, this scalability doesn’t relate to MVPs alone. All PHP apps, in their entirety, are just as scalable, so that organizations can be sure they won’t hit the performance limit. For sure, this mandates some expertise and effort from engineers, but it’s not something extraordinary. In our eyes, it is just a regular job requirement.

Benefit for web development #5. The technology offers security. It is a matching alternative when safety is at stake. The numerous built-in safeguards will protect your solution from attacks. With it, common risks, such as data tampering, SQL injections, etc., can be adequately mitigated.

Interesting fact: Guess what version of it is the most widely-spread among web presences? Version 7 with almost 59% of sites sticking to it. As such, it is ahead of the latest version 8.

Benefits of PHP. Three Questions to Ask

What causes the problem of legacy software which is a never-ending and costly headache for so many companies? The explanation is easy. Once, some technologies were in high demand and actively used for development. Then they suddenly fell out of favor in the community and got abandoned. Apps, relying on them, turned into incredibly-hard-to-support legacy pieces.

Can it be the case with PHP?

Just as with any other technology you might be contemplating right now, there are three simple questions to test the correctness of your choice for web development activities.

Question about benefits #1. Is this stuff time-tested, to some extent at least? The technology of choice should have been around for at least some time. Stay skeptical, abstain from trusting each new magical “silver bullet” or radical game-changer that is allegedly able to turn the tech domain upside down. In spite of universal passion for innovation, real life shows that the IT industry is more conservative than it seems at first sight.

Question about benefits #2. Is it properly and regularly maintained? Practice caution with technologies that haven't been updated for a while, as it means that there will be no chance to patch potential vulnerabilities in your resulting systems.

Question about benefits #3. Is there a community in place? A more or less significant group of collaborating tech practitioners should exist behind any tool. This is where one can look for best practices and actually hire skilled coders.

So, when voting for an option, be sure that all the aforementioned conditions are met in the web development universe. Speaking of the benefits of PHP, web development questions are answered in the affirmative here.

These are the three self-evident benefits of PHP.

Extra benefit for web development #1. Introduced in 1994, in its early formative days, PHP earned a reputation as merely a hobby-level programming means, because of its low learning curve and democratic entry barriers, with a mass of amateur developers. However, since that moment, it has come a long way from a templating tool for crafting small home pages to a mature language capable of tackling millions of requests per second.

Extra benefit for web development #2. One does care to maintain it in a healthy and workable shape. PHP has been rapidly evolving, especially over the previous decade. Relatively recently, even the entire non-profit PHP Foundation was established, backed by such renowned industry players as JetBrains, Automattic, Packagist Conductors, and Zend Technologies. They are supporting and promoting the technology by paying core developers for working full-time on its advancement.

Extra benefit for web development #3. PHP takes pride in its really large global community.

Figures do not lie, so let’s take a closer look at them. Packagist, a frequently used package manager, is at the level of roughly 1.5 billion downloads monthly and 50 billion downloads in total. Whatever issue developers encounter, there is a high chance that the solution is fully obtainable. This means that specialists can concentrate on resolving real-world business problems instead of working out their own technical solutions ad hoc, such as in the case of database communication, logging, etc.

In addition to that, the technology has popular frameworks, namely Laravel with over 4,000,000 downloads and Symfony with over 1,000,000 installs monthly. These mature frameworks have almost everything one needs to craft an outstanding web application, e.g. database abstraction, routing, queue management, sending emails, encryption, validation, etc.

There is also a dedicated community whose members devote their efforts to engineering asynchronous tools, such as Swoole, Amp, and ReactPHP, serving for the asynchronous work of web applications, as in the case of Node.js.

Wrapping up, the benefits of PHP are obvious.

NB. This relative simplicity, coupled with popularity, works as a magnet for countless unqualified engineers. Thus, practice caution while selecting a web development company to partner with. Undertake some background research, dive deeper into their portfolio of accomplished initiatives, and request confirmed references from their previous clients.

Any Cons of Importance?

Benefits are never alone. Problems might emerge with any tools. For sure, in case you contract a verified, skilled, and experienced custom development vendor, chances are these disadvantages won’t make themselves felt. However, making a wrong hiring decision could bring about some negative implications. Here is an approximate list of them:

Con against benefits #1. Some complain about somewhat inconsistent syntax. Indeed, when larger projects are at stake, the sheer scope of work can transform that syntax into an obstacle for engineers willing to read and maintain the code they are assigned to;

Con against benefits #2. Another factor to reckon with is a certain lack of built-in support for modern features, e.g. namespaces, strict typing, or, say, asynchronous programming. Yes, this problem can be addressed and tackled via extra libraries and frameworks, however, some expertise is needed to overcome this complexity;

Con against benefits #3. PHP's error handling potential is not universally as robust as with some other languages, which can make debugging more tedious, especially for novice developers;

Con against benefits #4. Mind the fragmented nature of the community. While the size of the group is a plus per se, multiple competing frameworks, libraries, and coding styles are a fact of life. Make sure you know the exact path to follow;

Con against benefits #5. Performance issues. In comparison with “neighbors”, e.g. Node.js or Go, the raw speed and efficiency for complex and high-traffic applications might lag behind.

Conclusion. Opt for Andersen’s Team for Development Challenges

In conclusion, PHP stands out as a robust, mature, and efficient programming language, boasting modern syntax and a vibrant community ready to address a wide array of challenges. If you remain uncertain about whether the PHP way aligns with your project needs, do not hesitate to reach out to Andersen's specialists for expert guidance. We are eager to address your inquiries and offer a comprehensive project assessment.

All in all, we have a lot to offer in this respect to generate benefits for customers:

• First, 80+ relevant initiatives we have successfully delivered;
• Second, our web development talent pool includes over 40+ engineers mastering the technology;
• Third, our extensive track record spans over 17 years in this particular development field;
• Our tech stack suffices for any web development initiative, encompassing frameworks, clouds, message brokers, databases, CMS, etc.

Let us become your strategic partner of the one-stop-shop type.