PHP in 2025 : Overrated or Still Underrated ??

"Every year, someone declares PHP dead. Yet in 2025, it’s still running over 75% of the web. Is it a dinosaur refusing to vanish — or a quiet workhorse we keep underestimating?"

1. The Reputation Problem

PHP has never been the cool kid in the programming world. It has always been the easy target in tech debates. People love to hate it. It’s been called messy, outdated, and “that language you learn when you don’t know better.”

The spaghetti code jokes? Endless.

But here’s the thing — while developers laugh, companies keep running PHP in production.

• Facebook started with PHP.

• WordPress, which powers 43% of all websites, is written in PHP.

• Even platforms like Slack and Etsy have roots in it.

If it’s so bad, why hasn’t it disappeared?

2. Why People Call It Overrated

Let’s be fair — there are reasons people roll their eyes at PHP:

• Old Syntax & Quirks → Early PHP code often looked messy, and bad tutorials made it worse.

• Not the Trendy Choice → In a world obsessed with Python, Go, and JavaScript, PHP feels “uncool.”

• Beginner Overuse → Many entry-level developers jumped into PHP without learning clean coding practices, giving it a bad reputation.

3. Why It’s Still Relevant (and Even Underrated)

Here’s the part that doesn’t get talked about enough — PHP in 2025 is not the same PHP from 2005.

• PHP 8+ is much faster and cleaner.

• Frameworks like Laravel have completely changed the development experience.

• For big companies, PHP is a stable, battle-tested choice.

And here’s a truth bomb: migrating millions of lines of code to a “cooler” language is expensive and risky. That’s why so many corporations stick with PHP — it works, it’s reliable, and they have entire systems built on it.

4. PHP in the Corporate World (2025 Reality Check)

Walk into a corporate IT department today, and chances are:

• Their internal tools? PHP.

• Their legacy CMS? PHP.

• That old but critical client dashboard? Also PHP.

Many companies would rather modernize their PHP code than rebuild entire systems from scratch. This means new devs who know PHP can still secure solid jobs in 2025 — even if it’s not the “hot” skill on X. This is from my personal experience too…

5. My Verdict

PHP isn’t the shiny new framework everyone is hyping about, or isn’t the language you brag about at a tech meetup… but it’s still one of the most useful, practical skills to have.
In my opinion, it’s not overrated — if anything, it’s quietly underrated. but it’s far from irrelevant.
If anything, it’s underrated in 2025 — because the loudest voices in tech are chasing trends, while PHP quietly keeps the internet running.