Common PHP Development Tools

First, if you still don’t know what PHP is, you should go set up a PHP environment. After that, the next step is to think about which development tool to choose! Honestly, there are plenty of PHP development tools out there. Today’s PHP tutorial downloads section will cover some of the better PHP development tools currently available. Detailed usage of each PHP development tool will be explained in later PHP tutorials!

1. Notepad++, EditPlus, and Dreamweaver Series
Free, supports multiple languages, syntax highlighting, fast and convenient, but lacks syntax hints, debugging, and other features. Suitable for small projects and beginners!
2. phpDesigner
Not only supports PHP but also other web languages like HTML, XHTML, XML, CSS, JavaScript, VBScript, Java, C#, Perl, and Python. Widely used.
3. Zend Development Environment
A PHP IDE launched by ZEND, the company closest to PHP. Versions are available for both Linux and Windows, but it is slow and inconvenient.
4. PHPED
PHPED offers the best overall performance, starts up very quickly, and provides the most features.
5. PHP Expert Editor
Includes PHP syntax checking, script bookmarks, macro functionality, code templates, built-in web server, and debugger.
6. NetBeans
NetBeans is an open-source integrated development environment, an open framework and extensible development platform that can be used for developing in Java, C/C++, PHP, and other languages. It is itself a development platform that can extend functionality through plugins.
7. Zend Studio (Check out Zend Studio 9.0.2 download and license key announcement)
Zend Studio is the only integrated development environment (IDE) professional developers need throughout the entire PHP development lifecycle. With a comprehensive set of editing, debugging, analysis, optimization, and database tools, Zend Studio accelerates the development cycle and simplifies complex application scenarios. Additionally, this official software has won numerous awards.
8. PDT (Eclipse PHP Development Tools) (Check out the official Eclipse for PHP download)
The Eclipse integrated development environment can achieve corresponding functionality as long as plugins are available. Still, it cannot compare to Zend  Studio.
9. PHPEdit
PHPEdit is a Windows-only IDE that is very easy to set up. It even has a PHP version. It does a great job with code intelligence for PHP, CSS, and HTML, but does not provide code intelligence support for JavaScript. The official version seems to require payment!
10. EasyPHP
EasyPHP software helps you manage data, develop sites, and build applications using PHP. It is a great tool for debugging PHP programs.