Rails, or even more so php have VERY little to bring to the table in 2026 going forward. Rails (ruby) is still a saner language than PHP, but as slow as php is. (granted ruby is not idiotic like PHP and runs rather than start/die).
If you go the LLM route something like Go is probably the goto default for MOST networking/web-first apps. You get static types, and a fast compile cycle (rust is still very slow here), and IF you want more from the language you can use something like Lisette (<a href="https://lisette.run/" rel="nofollow">https://lisette.run/).
Bottom line is dynamic languages are obsolete. There is really no benefits from using them outside very small throw away scripts.
Citation needed? I love hating PHP, but of the reasons I would chose something other than PHP, speed and resource consumption is pretty far down the list?
PHP is sync. This means every IO operation i do runs sync. This is why PHP will always be the slowest ones out there. Open a file, SQL queries, sending emails etc. Its all sync. Its all slow.
PS. I fully aware of hacks around this like reactphp and the other related async things, but those are all just heavy dependencies and for most sane devs non starters.
I must admit I haven't run the numbers, but if this can be trusted, sync PHP isn't far off from golang - while async does rather well?
I probably would only reach for PHP if I needed to run on shared hosting (or rather, my customers did) - in which case few other technologies would compete, obviously.
PS: golang is much faster at cpu - in this case one might argue a fairer comparison would use a compiled extension on the php side IMNHO - as that seems a likely path if a real project was cpu bound on a few small functions.
shikck200 · · focus · HN ↗
If you go the LLM route something like Go is probably the goto default for MOST networking/web-first apps. You get static types, and a fast compile cycle (rust is still very slow here), and IF you want more from the language you can use something like Lisette (<a href="https://lisette.run/" rel="nofollow">https://lisette.run/).
Bottom line is dynamic languages are obsolete. There is really no benefits from using them outside very small throw away scripts.
e12e · · focus · HN ↗
Citation needed? I love hating PHP, but of the reasons I would chose something other than PHP, speed and resource consumption is pretty far down the list?
shikck200 · · focus · HN ↗
PS. I fully aware of hacks around this like reactphp and the other related async things, but those are all just heavy dependencies and for most sane devs non starters.
e12e · · focus · HN ↗
I must admit I haven't run the numbers, but if this can be trusted, sync PHP isn't far off from golang - while async does rather well?
I probably would only reach for PHP if I needed to run on shared hosting (or rather, my customers did) - in which case few other technologies would compete, obviously.
<a href="https://phpbenchlab.com/php-vs-nodejs-vs-go-vs-python-io-benchmark-2026/" rel="nofollow">https://phpbenchlab.com/php-vs-nodejs-vs-go-vs-python-io-ben...
> PHP 8.5 vs Node.js vs Go vs Python: I/O Performance Under Real Database Load (2026)
Thought it could warrant some discussion - maybe someone will spot obvious errors?
<a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49845870">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49845870
PS: golang is much faster at cpu - in this case one might argue a fairer comparison would use a compiled extension on the php side IMNHO - as that seems a likely path if a real project was cpu bound on a few small functions.
<a href="https://phpbenchlab.com/php-8-5-vs-nodejs-vs-go-vs-python-cpu-benchmark-2026/" rel="nofollow">https://phpbenchlab.com/php-8-5-vs-nodejs-vs-go-vs-python-cp...