php-lsp 0.1.53

A PHP Language Server Protocol implementation
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php-lsp

A high-performance PHP language server written in Rust.

Build Crates.io License: MIT

Getting Started · Features · Editors & AI Clients · Configuration · Architecture · Contributing

php-lsp is a full-featured LSP implementation for PHP: real-time cross-file diagnostics, type-aware completions, navigation, and refactoring — written in Rust for low memory usage, fast startup, and zero GC pauses.

Unique strengths:

  • Full LSP 3.17 specification support — call hierarchy, type hierarchy, semantic tokens, inlay hints, selection range, linked editing, and more — features that competing servers lock behind premium tiers or skip entirely
  • Rich code actions — 10 actions (extract variable/method/constant, inline variable, generate constructor/getters/setters, implement missing methods, organize imports, add PHPDoc, add return type), all free
  • Clean separation of concerns — parsing (php-rs-parser, php-ast) and static analysis (mir-php) are dedicated crates, keeping the LSP layer lightweight and focused purely on protocol features
  • Rust-native performance — async-first with tokio, lock-free document store via dashmap, no GC pauses
  • Completion depth — type-aware -> / :: chains, match enum-case completions, auto use insertion, fuzzy camel/underscore matching

Install

cargo install php-lsp

Or download a pre-built binary (macOS, Linux) from Releases and place it on your PATH.

Verify:

php-lsp --version

For full installation options see docs/getting-started.md.

Editor Setup

Editor Setup
VS Code php-lsp extension
Neovim 0.11+ Native vim.lsp.enable
Neovim 0.10 vim.lsp.start in a FileType autocmd
Zed lsp block in ~/.config/zed/settings.json
Cursor Settings → Features → Language Servers
PHPStorm LSP4IJ plugin
Claude Code claude plugin add https://github.com/jorgsowa/claude-php-lsp-plugin

Config snippets for every editor: docs/editors.md

Configuration

Pass options via initializationOptions:

{
  "phpVersion": "8.2",
  "excludePaths": ["cache/*", "storage/*"],
  "diagnostics": {
    "deprecatedCalls": false
  }
}

phpVersion is optional — the server auto-detects it from composer.json (config.platform.php, then require.php) and falls back to the php binary on $PATH. Set it explicitly only to override.

See docs/configuration.md for all options including per-diagnostic toggles.

Comparison

Server Language License Maintained
php-lsp Rust ✅ Free/OSS ✅ Active
Intelephense TypeScript ⚠️ Freemium ✅ Active
PHPantom Rust ✅ Free/OSS ✅ Active
Phpactor PHP ✅ Free/OSS ✅ Active
DEVSENSE Node.js 🔒 Paid ✅ Active
Psalm LSP PHP ✅ Free/OSS ✅ Active
phpls Go ✅ Free/OSS ✅ Active
felixfbecker PHP ✅ Free/OSS ❌ Abandoned

Feature matrix:

Feature php-lsp Intelephense PHPantom Phpactor DEVSENSE Psalm
Completion ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ⚠️ limited
Hover ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅
Go-to-definition ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅
Go-to-declaration ✅ 🔒 Premium ❌ ✅ ✅ ❌
Go-to-type-definition ✅ 🔒 Premium ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
Find references ✅ ✅ ❌ ✅ ✅ ❌
Rename ✅ 🔒 Premium ✅ ✅ ✅ ❌
Call hierarchy ✅ ❌ ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
Type hierarchy ✅ 🔒 Premium ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
Implementations ✅ 🔒 Premium ❌ ✅ ✅ ❌
Semantic tokens ✅ ❌ ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
Inlay hints ✅ ❌ ❌ ✅ ✅ ❌
Code lens ✅ 🔒 Premium ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
Signature help ✅ ✅ ❌ ✅ ✅ ❌
Selection range ✅ ❌ ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
Document highlight ✅ ❌ ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
Folding ✅ 🔒 Premium ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
On-type formatting ✅ ❌ ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
Document links ✅ ❌ ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
PSR-4 autoload ✅ ✅ ❌ ✅ ✅ ❌
PhpStorm meta ✅ ❌ ❌ ❌ ❌ ❌
Static analysis ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅✅
Embedded HTML/JS/CSS ❌ ✅ ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
Laravel/framework aware ❌ ⚠️ plugin ✅ built-in ❌ ⚠️ plugin ❌
Debugger ❌ ❌ ❌ ❌ ✅ ❌
Deep generics / PHPStan types ⚠️ partial ⚠️ partial ✅ ❌ ✅ ✅

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md. Open an issue before starting non-trivial work. PRs require clean cargo test and cargo clippy -- -D warnings.

License

MIT