New PHP features often get declined or stall because nobody knows how many developers would actually use them. This RFC from Daniil Gentili wants to replace that guesswork with real usage data. It proposes an official second edition of PHP called php-community, which would ship experimental features early so anyone can try them.

How it would work

php-community would be based on the latest stable PHP release. It would live on a new community branch of php-src and be published on php.net next to the regular releases. A new version would come out every month, named by date (for example, php-community 2026.03.01), with nightly builds as well. There would be official packages for the major Linux distributions, plus the usual macOS and Windows builds.

Each experimental feature would be a "feature extension": built in, but disabled by default. Every feature has its own version number and can require or conflict with other features, much like Composer packages. You'd turn one on in code:

PhpFeature::get("performance", "^2")->enable();

The plan is for the Composer autoloader to handle this for you. Features can't be enabled in php.ini, since many shared hosts don't let you edit it. For features that can't be switched on at runtime, there's a #![feature()] line you add at the top of your entry file.

To keep shared hosting safe, a new sandboxing_level setting in php.ini would disable risky groups of functions at once, such as shell execution or eval.

Community RFCs

Features would arrive through a lighter process than the normal RFC:

  • A proposal is a GitHub issue in a new repository.
  • Anyone can vote with 👍 or 👎, and those votes count for half the result. Internals members with voting rights count for the other half.
  • At least half of the internals voters must take part, which means internals can block a result by not voting.
  • The people who add a feature are responsible for maintaining it, not the php-src maintainers.
  • After at least 6 months in a stable php-community release, a feature can go through a regular RFC to land in PHP itself.
  • A feature that's unused or has no maintainer can be removed through its own vote.

What it means for you

Regular PHP releases wouldn't change. php-community would be a separate download you opt into, though the RFC does suggest that most new features should go through it first.

Where it stands

It's under discussion. It was first written on March 14, 2026, and hasn't gone to a vote.