Upcoming PHP switch

Today (September 26, 2019) PHP released PHP 7.3.10. This is significant because it represents the 10th release of PHP 7.3. We now consider this PHP version to be stable and mature. As a result of this, we will be making some changes to our PHP infrastructure within the next coming weeks.

Technically we are still waiting for cPanel to release PHP 7.3.10 on their end – so this version technically isn’t available to us right now. But it should be soon.

An exact timeline of the events is still undetermined as of now and it may be impossible to give an exact timeline, but this is our current line of thinking:

1st or 2nd week of October – We will switch to assigning PHP 7.3 on all new accounts. That means any new web hosting account that is created after this date will use PHP 7.3 by default.

Around the middle of November (possibly spilling over through the first week of December) – We will be switching all existing accounts over to PHP 7.3. This means all current accounts will be switched to PHP 7.3 at this time. This is fluid because it depends on how the switch to PHP 7.3 to new accounts take hold.

We are not removing PHP 7.1 as options. At least not yet.

Around the end of Q1 2020 or the start of Q2 2020 (March/April/May 2020) – We will start removing PHP 7.1 as options. This is a fluid deadline – meaning it’s open to change. A lot of this will depend on how the uptake of PHP 7.3 holds.

Keep in mind, PHP 7.1 support officially ends on December 1, 2019 that is why this change is being made:

https://www.php.net/supported-versions.php

As long as you are using an up-to-date and reputable script – such as WordPress, Joomla!, Drupal, etc. – these script began support PHP 7.3 a long time ago and their developers are well aware of PHP 7.1’s upcoming end-of-life. You are more likely to run into issues with plugins/themes/components/extensions that you may be using but have been abandoned by their individual developers. If any plugin/theme/component/extension you are using hasn’t been updated in years, now might be a good time to inquire on their development status with their individual developers. If you get no response, then it stands as good reason that the plugin/theme/component/extension has been abandoned.

What if my script breaks after the upgrade to PHP 7.3?
No worries. We can switch you back to PHP 7.1 – which is what all of the accounts on our servers are running now. But if you’re script breaks after switching to PHP 7.3 then this would really signal that you need to figure out what is wrong with your script and why it doesn’t support the latest version of PHP. You will need to resolve these issues because we won’t be able to offer PHP 7.1 forever.

What about PHP 7.2?
PHP 7.2 is also an option if your script doesn’t work with PHP 7.3. However, the lifetime of PHP 7.2 isn’t that much longer (support ends in December 2020). And really if a script works in PHP 7.1 but doesn’t work in PHP 7.3 but does work with PHP 7.2, then this is just kicking the can further down the road. Still… this is technically a viable option… just not a very good one in our opinion.