PHP 7 revived the language after years on PHP 5: WordPressA PHP CMS powering millions of sites — themes, plugins, and the block editor for publishing., Laravel, and SymfonyA PHP framework and component library — enterprise web apps and APIs across Europe. sites ran dramatically faster on the same hardware. Scalar types and return declarations brought optional static discipline without losing PHP's deploy-by-FTPFile Transfer Protocol — a classic protocol for uploading and downloading files over networks. simplicity.

PHP 7 was the performance reboot that kept PHP relevant against NodeNode.js — JavaScript on the server via an event-driven runtime built on V8. and PythonA high-level language known for readability — dominant in data science, scripting, and web backends..

A 2× speedup on real workloads changed hosting economics for millions of sites.