Top 10 PHP Tools Every Programmer/Software Developer Must Know

Designed to simplify web development, PHP has become one of the most popular programming languages for web development. It was launched in 1994 by Rasmus Lerdorf and has evolved to get versions up to PHP 7.3 which was released in December 2018. The latest version- PHP 7.4 and PHP 8 are expected to be released in November 2019 and fourth quarter of 2020 respectively. In order to ace in their development game, the programmers and software developers not only need to keep a tab on the PHP trends for the year but also need to stay aware of the PHP tools to automate, streamline, and quicken their development process. Being a web developer, you should certainly know at least the top 10 PHP tools; if not, here is the list to keep you posted.

NetBeans

Released in 1996, NetBeans is one of the most popular tools among the software developers and programmers. This tool is written in JAVA but still has complete support for all other languages like HTML5, PHP, C++, and C, etc. The best part is that this tool is available for free!

Top Feature

It supports all PHP content management systems and frameworks like Zend, WordPress, CakePHP, etc., and is laced with a debugger and source code editor.

PHP Designer

The IDE or Integrated Development Environment offered by PHPDesigner is great for all the beginners. The PHPDesigner 8 has been launched recently and its speed and power are something even the biggest companies offering PHP development in India are talking about. Touted as an all-in-one website editor, it supports all PHP frameworks and even Object Oriented Programming to save time & efforts.

Top Feature

The PHPDesigner tool allows the developers and programmers to check the real-time syntax, intelligently highlight syntax, even has a code beautifier.

Eclipse

The most commonly used Integrated Development Environment for the JAVA programmers is Eclipse. This cross-platform tool has complete support for all operating systems like Linux, Mac, and Windows. It is an open-source software tool that allows quick PHP code compilation along with auto-formatting.

Top Feature

It is rated among the top PHP tools as it facilitates easy tools integration, offers numerous plugins, automates error reporting, and supports all non-GUI and GUI apps.

PHP Storm

Supporting almost all PHP CMS and web frameworks like WordPress, Joomla, Laravel, Magento, Yii, and Zend, PHPStorm has gained fame as one of the best PHP tools for the developers and programmers. It was developed by JetBeans in 2009 and is one of the IDEs that coordinate with all other PHP tools to streamline and quicken the development.

Top Feature

PHPStorm is known for the unmatched features that it offers like command line tools, control system, live-editing, syntax highlighting, and Version Control System integration.

XAMPP

Originally a database manager, XAMPP has gained popularity in the developer community owing to easy and quick installation. This open-source comes free of cost and has Bitnami that allows various Content Management Systems to run over this. These CMS components allow developers to manage their digital content.

Top Feature

The XAMPP tool is a cross-platform tool and can easily run on all types of operating systems like Linux, Windows, Mac, etc., across various devices.

Zend Studio

The optimal and exceptional speed offered by Zend Studio is the reason many developers tend to turn towards this development tool. This IDE was launched in the year 2016 by Zend Technologies and has become a popular PHP tool in a short time. Zend Studio brings an intelligent user interface to the web development that lets the developers stay in-line with the current trends.

Top Feature

The support that Zend Studio has for searching and indexing PHP codes, content management systems like Joomla and WordPress, and cloud services like AWS and Azure makes it more popular.

Aptana Studio

The list of the top 10 PHP tools for programmers and software developers can never be complete without the mention of Aptana Studio. It was launched in November 2014 by Aptana Inc. and is widely used for JavaScript, PHP, CSS3, HTML5, Python, Ruby, and other client or server-side web technologies. The developers are also facilitated with features like debugger, command line interface, and GIT integration.

Top Feature

This PHP tool makes coding easier for programmers by formatting and indexing the codes automatically. It is also capable of supporting CSS, DOM, and PHP Debugger.

Codelobster

Supported by all types of PHP frameworks and content management systems like WordPress, Drupal, Joomla, JavaScript, JQuery, CSS, HTML, Twig, etc., Codelobster is a freemium PHP Integrated Development Environment. It is portable IDE which makes it quite popular among in the developer community.

Top Feature

It is laced with numerous features like code validator, auto code completer, debugger, syntax highlighter, SQL manager, etc. It also supports macro checking and code collapsing to ease the work of developers.

PhpED

A PHP editing tool launched in the year 2001 by the company NUSphere, PhpED enables the programmers and the software developers to edit their codes professionally. Not only does it support PHP 7.1 and all other versions after that but it also offers complete support to other frameworks like JavaScript, HTML5, and CSS3.

Top Feature

Whether you want to debug your codes remotely or locally, want to display or hide some parts of the file, or code insights for PHP, PhpED is the tool you need.

Komodo IDE

This Integrated Development Environment was introduced by ActiveState in the year 2000 and if one of the best IDEs for dynamic programming languages. Having a number of pipe features and extensions, Komodo IDE is a popular PHP tool.

Top Feature

This tool works wonders in adding ease to project management with features like unit testing, debugging, etc.

The top ten PHP tools were listed in the article above. Whether you are a beginner or a pro with web development languages, these tools are must-know to ease your coding process and eliminate any error for a more efficient programming.