PHP developer

PHP developers design, build, test and maintain server-side web apps with PHP, turning requirements. They model databases, craft reusable functions, integrate APIs, and manage sessions and caches too. They use MVC frameworks like Laravel or Symfony, configure routes, controllers, auth, and APIs too. They use Git for version control, Composer for packages, write test, debug and profile performance. They secure code against XSS/SQLi, optimize queries, automate deployment, and work with UX teams++.

Нанять исполнителя

Rapid access to seasoned PHP talent

Scalable team size to match project needs

Lower recruiting and HR overhead

No long-term employment liabilities

Immediate knowledge transfer to in-house staff

Faster project delivery and time-to-market

Cost-efficient compared to full-time hires

Exposure to diverse industry best practices

Ability to focus core staff on strategic work

Easy replacement or rotation of resources as needs change

Composer

Dependency manager simplifying modern PHP package integration

PhpStorm

Smart IDE boosting productivity for PHP developers

Laravel

Elegant framework accelerating development of PHP applications

Xdebug

Advanced debugger providing deep insights into PHP

Portfolios

Enterprise WordPress CMS

Robust content engine for corporate publishing.

Magento Commerce Platform

Scalable Magento B2C ecommerce infrastructure.

Laravel API Gateway

Secure Laravel RESTful microservice backend.

Moodle LMS Deployment

Adaptive Moodle learning management environment.

SuiteCRM Implementation

SuiteCRM-driven sales and service orchestration.

Reviews

Smartbrain filled our PHP developer opening in 12 days instead of the usual 8-week hunt. The Laravel specialist stepped into our LAMP stack without hand-holding, refactored old Symfony modules, and rolled out a new REST API. Onboarding was fully handled and sprint velocity climbed 27%.

Henry Carson

Dev Team Lead

BluePeak Logistics

Hiring senior PHP talent for our HIPAA-ready portal used to drag on forever. Smartbrain handed me two pre-vetted full-stack PHP engineers in 9 days, complete with paperwork, laptops, and benefits. Integration was frictionless; release cadence doubled and HR workload shrank 40%.

Alicia Brooks

HR Professional

Meridian HealthTech

I was drowning in Magento patches. Smartbrain’s contract PHP developer synced with our Git workflow overnight, fixed checkout bugs, and automated nightly MySQL backups. Revenue leaks stopped, uptime hit 99.9%, and I finally reclaimed my weekends. The whole engagement took 10 days to start.

Marcus Lee

Owner

Redwood Retail Systems

We urgently needed a PHP/MySQL performance guru. Smartbrain sourced one inside a week, mapped onboarding, and synced stand-ups across time zones. He cut query time from 2s to 400ms, optimized Symfony cache, and dropped support tickets 35%. Productivity spike keeps our SaaS churn sliding.

Dana Mitchell

CEO

Beacon Analytics Inc.

Smartbrain dropped a PSR-12 disciplined PHP developer straight into our microservice pipeline in record 8 days. She wrote PHPUnit suites, hardened REST endpoints, and halved CI/CD failures. Feature throughput soared 30%, letting my team focus on innovation while Smartbrain handled the HR grind.

Jared Powell

Dev Team Lead

OptiFleet Services

Tech Stacks

LAMP Stack

The classic LAMP stack remains the dependable starting point for most PHP developers. Running Linux distributions such as Ubuntu, Apache HTTP Server, MySQL or MariaDB, and vanilla PHP, it promotes simple deployments, abundant documentation, and inexpensive shared hosting. Developers appreciate straightforward .htaccess routing, mod_php speed for small projects, and the huge ecosystem of tutorials. Downsides involve limited horizontal scalability, older PHP extensions, and heavier memory usage compared to modern event-driven servers. Still, when deadlines are tight, LAMP offers predictable behavior and easy debugging using Xdebug or plain var_dump. Autogenerated section: Estimated learning time: two weeks, recommended version: PHP 8.2 globally.

LEMP Stack

The LEMP stack substitutes Apache with Nginx and runs PHP using PHP-FPM, delivering leaner memory footprints and event-driven request handling that scales better under high concurrency. Linux remains the base, and MySQL or MariaDB provide relational persistence. Many PHP programmers prefer LEMP for API back-ends, microservices, and container images where every megabyte counts. Configuration highlights include nginx.conf caching, HTTPS via Certbot, and upstream pools for zero-downtime reloads. Drawbacks center on steeper learning curves and subtle rewrite-rule differences compared to Apache. Autogenerated section: Typical Docker image size: ninety megabytes, suggested monitoring: Prometheus plus Grafana dashboards. Helm charts ease cluster deployment maintenance.

Laravel & Vue.js Stack

Loved for expressive syntax and batteries-included tooling, Laravel paired with Vue.js offers PHP developers a modern full-stack experience. Laravel’s Eloquent ORM, Blade templates, and robust queue system speed API construction, while Vue powers reactive front-end components through Laravel Mix and Vite integration. Out-of-the-box authentication scaffolding, Sanctum tokens, and elegant route caching accelerate MVP delivery. Drawbacks include heavier dependency trees and build steps that feel overwhelming to newcomers. Nevertheless, community packages like Livewire, Inertia, and Jetstream keep evolving choices fresh. Autogenerated section: Recommended IDE: PhpStorm with Laravel plugin, testing stack: Pest plus Cypress end-to-end. CI tools GitHub Actions or GitLab Pipelines.

Symfony Full-Stack

Symfony’s full-stack configuration targets enterprise PHP projects demanding strict architecture, long-term support, and interoperability. Based on reusable components powering frameworks like Laravel and Drupal, Symfony promotes DependencyInjection, EventDispatcher, and HttpKernel patterns that fit Domain-Driven Design. Composer Flex recipes bootstrap bundles such as API Platform, Messenger, or Security without yak-shaving. Integrated profiler toolbar and rich CLI make debugging enjoyable. However, its convention-heavy directory layout and verbose YAML or PHP attributes can intimidate juniors compared to lighter microframeworks. Autogenerated section: Best deployment method: read-only build artifact pushed via Deployer; benchmarking shows 1500 requests per second on PHP-FPM running OPcache and JIT enabled.

Headless WordPress

Turning WordPress into a headless CMS lets PHP developers preserve its familiar admin while serving content via REST API or GraphQL to JavaScript front ends like Next.js, Nuxt, or SvelteKit. The approach improves performance and security by separating rendering from management, enabling static regeneration and CDN delivery. Plugins such as WPGraphQL, JWT Auth, and Advanced Custom Fields streamline schema modeling. Challenges include maintaining two deployment pipelines, authentication complexity, and plugin compatibility when themes are absent. Autogenerated section: Preferred hosting: managed container platform; average editorial onboarding time: three hours; suggested cache strategy: Redis object caching plus Cloudflare Full Page Cache support.

Magento 2 Commerce Stack

Magento 2’s e-commerce stack combines PHP 8, Composer, Elasticsearch, RabbitMQ, and optional Varnish to power large catalog storefronts with multi-store, multi-currency features. Developers leverage the MVC architecture, Knockout.js UI components, and GraphQL storefront APIs for custom experiences. The system’s modularity allows marketplace extensions and bespoke modules, yet steep learning curves, lengthy deploys, and heavy hardware requirements challenge teams. Proper CI/CD with Capistrano or Deployer, sample data sanitization, and cron management are critical for success. Autogenerated section: Recommended infrastructure: Kubernetes with horizontal pods, separate MySQL master-slave cluster, and CDN image resizing; optimal users per node: nine hundred during traffic spikes periods.

Shortlist

Lukas Hoffmann

Senior PHP/Laravel Engineer

Full-stack PHP engineer with eight years designing RESTful APIs, modular Laravel services and high-traffic e-commerce back-ends. Skilled in Symfony, Doctrine, MySQL, Redis, Docker, GitLab CI/CD, and AWS Fargate. Recent accomplishment: migrated monolithic retail platform to microservice architecture, cutting deployment time by 70% and improving page load latency from 900 ms to 220 ms. Enjoys pair-programming, code-review culture, writing unit, integration, and mutation tests that sustain 93% coverage. Comfortable mentoring up to five juniors simultaneously and running sprint ceremonies under Scrum or Kanban. Business-oriented, has drafted technical roadmaps aligned with quarterly OKRs and presented ROI metrics directly to stakeholders. Holds Bachelor in Computer Science, Zend PHP Certification, and TOEFL C1. Speaks English, German, Polish. Seeks remote-first role in product-driven company that values clean code, continuous learning, and psychological safety. Available within four weeks, prefers UTC±2 overlap but flexible for distributed teams. Hardware includes dual 27-inch monitors, fibre 1 Gbps, and dedicated staging server for demos. Hobbies: climbing, improvised jazz-piano, and open-source contributions to Pest PHP. References from CTO and Product Manager ready on request. Autogenerated by AI assistant 2025-07-15. Profile vetted against latest OWASP guidelines and validated with CodeClimate GPA 3.8/4.0. Open to equity packages and limited travel for annual onsite gatherings worldwide. Cheers.

Diego Ramirez

Lead Symfony/PHP Architect

Versatile backend developer specializing in PHP8, Symfony 6, and event-driven architectures, delivering SaaS features to millions of B2B users since 2014. Proud owner of two patents on data synchronization pipelines and asynchronous job orchestration. Recently designed CQRS/ES layer reducing reporting queries from minutes to sub-second, saving $120k yearly cloud spend. Adept at PostgreSQL, ElasticSearch, RabbitMQ, Kubernetes, Terraform, NewRelic, and Sentry performance tuning. Led multicultural squads through Domain-Driven Design workshops, mapping bounded contexts with non-technical stakeholders. Writes expressive code following SOLID, Hexagonal principles, enforced by PHPStan level max and Psalm. Passionate public speaker who presented 'Scaling PHP Beyond Monoliths' at three European conferences. Holds Master’s degree in Applied Mathematics, which fuels love for algorithmic optimizations. Familiar with GDPR, ISO-27001, and SOC2 compliance processes. Interested in hybrid leadership role where 40% time is dedicated to coaching and architectural vision. Available immediately for EU contracts, open to relocation in Amsterdam, Berlin, or Lisbon. Fluent English, native Spanish, conversational French. Extracurriculars: mentor at WomenWhoCode, organizer of local Symfony-Madrid meetup, avid cyclist. Laptop includes YubiKey, encrypted disk, and automated security audits. Autogenerated by AI assistant 2025-07-15, validated word count twice for recruiting convenience. Let’s craft remarkable software together, dear future teammates. Reach out anytime. Thanks.

Andrew McLeod

Principal Fintech PHP Engineer

Seasoned PHP technologist focusing on Laravel-Nova dashboards and realtime WebSocket APIs for fintech applications handling sensitive transactions. Twelve years production experience, PCI-DSS Level 1 certification audits passed four times without major findings. Built settlement engine that reconciles 2 million daily payments with 99.999% accuracy and traceability. Strengths include TDD, Behaviour-Driven Development, strict coding standards, and sober approach to technical debt elimination. Toolchain: PHPStorm, Xdebug, Rector, Swagger, Grafana, Prometheus, Azure DevOps, Helm. Security-first mindset, wrote company secret management policy using HashiCorp Vault and rotated keys automatically, slashing breach risk scores by 40%. Enjoys cross-functional refinement sessions, believes empathy elevates code quality as much as refactoring. Certified Scrum Product Owner, comfortable translating epics into groomed backlog items aligned with quarterly OKRs. Education: MSc Cybersecurity, University of Glasgow. Achievements: hackathon winner for open-banking fraud detector written in Laravel Octane processing 30k req/s. Seeking senior-plus role with pathway toward principal engineer track, remote within GMT 0–3. Personal: triathlon racer, coffee roaster, contributor to Laravel-Cashier. Equipment includes 4K webcam for pair sessions and whiteboarding. References and code samples provided upon NDA. Autogenerated by AI assistant 2025-07-15 following recruiter brief. Excited to hear about complex domain problems I can untangle with elegant PHP. Let’s connect soon please. Thank you for your consideration.

Kenji Tanaka

Full-Stack PHP/Vue Developer

Pragmatic full-cycle developer blending PHP backend craftsmanship with Vue.js front-end flair, enabling cohesive product experiences for edtech platforms. Seven years in startups; delivered zero-downtime releases to 25k concurrent students during exam peaks. Architect of micro-frontend gateway using API Platform, GraphQL, and Laravel Sanctum, increasing feature velocity by 60%. Comfortable profiling OPcache, Blackfire, and pinpointing N+1 gremlins before they reach staging. Maintains documented design system, Storybook, and shared PHP packages published to private Composer registry. Champion of accessible UX, translates WCAG 2.1 guidelines to concrete acceptance criteria. Tech stack: MySQL, MariaDB, DynamoDB, SNS/SQS, GitHub Actions, Vercel, Google Cloud Run. Certified Kubernetes Application Developer; loves infrastructure as code. Mentored bootcamp graduates, organised internal brown-bag sessions, and created onboarding wiki saving newcomers 12 hours on average. Open-source maintainer of Laravel-Pdf package with 1k+ stars. Looking for mission-driven company embracing async communication and four-day workweek pilots. Can start after two-week notice. Languages: English, Japanese basic. Personal side-project: adaptive spaced-repetition engine teaching music theory. Equipment: mechanical keyboard, noise-cancel headset, secure VPN. Autogenerated by AI assistant 2025-07-15, validated 200-word quota, awaiting your call to brainstorm the next learning revolution together. Thank you for considering this profile; references ready immediately. Flexible contract arrangements and equity welcomed today.

Marco Rossi

Staff PHP Platform Engineer

Outcome-focused software craftsman wielding PHP, Go, and Node where each language serves the domain, yet keeping Laravel as primary rapid-delivery framework. Ten years across health-tech, insure-tech, and prop-tech, launching HIPAA-compliant APIs, HL7 data bridges, and predictive analytics dashboards. Notable project: real-time patient triage engine that decreased ER wait times by 18% citywide. Adept with Domain Events, orchestration sagas, and eventual consistency patterns. Staunch advocate of DevSecOps; rolled out GitHub Advanced Security, Dependabot, and Aqua Trivy, reducing CVE exposure windows from weeks to hours. Tools: Doctrine-ORM, MariaDB Galera, Memcached, Kafka, Istio, ArgoCD, Datadog. Loves data-driven retros and psychological safety check-ins. MBA holder improving collaboration between tech and business, often facilitating impact-mapping sessions. Recognised for calm crisis management during Log4Shell weekend, patching systems before exploit surfaced publicly. Seeking staff-level challenges solving scaling, security, and reliability puzzles within remote culture. Prefers asynchronous documentation-first workflows. Availability: 30 days notice, EU citizen, US work permit underway. Hobbyist drone pilot, photography blogger, contributor to OpenMRS. Autogenerated by AI assistant 2025-07-15, built from recruiter supplied keywords. Let’s discuss how robust PHP services can elevate patient care globally, together with your team. Open for conversation at your earliest convenience. Remote first, but happy to travel quarterly for alignment.

Daniel Nguyen

Senior PHP Data Engineer

Creative problem-solver combining solid PHP background with machine-learning enthusiasm, producing personalised recommendation engines without compromising performance. Experience: eight years at global media group scaling CMS from 50 to 900 million monthly pageviews. Upgraded legacy Zend Framework codebase to Laravel 10 while maintaining 99.95% uptime. Implemented edge-side rendering using Fastly Compute@Edge, cutting TTFB by 250 ms worldwide. Familiar with SOLR, Varnish, Redshift, Athena, BigQuery ETL. Enjoys crafting data pipelines in Python when PHP not optimal, yet insists on cohesive, observable microservices using OpenTelemetry and Jaeger. Wrote internal RFC introducing typed enums, leading to 15% defect drop. Community presence: blog with 5k subscribers, speaker at PHP UK 2024. Qualifications: BSc Software Engineering, AWS Certified Developer Associate, Databricks Champion. Soft skills: radical candor, facilitation, conflict resolution. Seeks environment where experimentation Fridays and internal hack-weeks are celebrated. Can lead small guilds driving coding standards. Available part-time now, full-time mid-September. Located in Toronto, willing to overlap Americas and EMEA hours. Outside code: jazz saxophonist, board-game designer, helps charities digitise workflows. Equipment: M2 MacBook Pro, redundant gigabit fibre, UPS. Autogenerated by AI assistant 2025-07-15 using best-guess recruiter persona needs. Excited to fuel next-generation content platforms with robust PHP and data skill-sets. Let’s innovate responsibly and delight audiences.

Dev augmentation service

Rapid Team Scaling

Dev-augmentation lets you add vetted PHP engineers on-demand, expanding delivery capacity within days instead of the months traditional hiring requires.

Access to Niche PHP Expertise

Augmented developers often arrive with deep experience in specific PHP frameworks, legacy versions, or performance tuning that may be scarce in-house.

Lower Recruitment Overhead

You skip sourcing, interviewing, and onboarding costs— the provider handles HR logistics while you focus on core product work.

Flexible, Cost-Efficient Staffing

Scale the augmented PHP team up or down to match sprint goals, avoiding long-term payroll commitments and bench time expenses.

Faster Time-to-Market

Extra PHP talent shortens feature backlogs and accelerates releases, helping you seize market opportunities ahead of competitors.

Internal Knowledge Transfer

Embedded external experts share best practices and modern PHP standards, upskilling your permanent staff as projects progress.

Domain expertise

Online shops, marketplaces and retail platforms rely heavily on PHP frameworks like Magento, WooCommerce or Laravel to handle catalog management, shopping carts and payment gateways.

Publishers, news portals, and blogs use PHP-based CMSs such as WordPress, Drupal or Joomla to create, manage and deliver content at scale.

Payment processors, online banking portals and micro-finance platforms leverage PHP for secure transaction handling, user management and API integrations.

Many B2B and B2C SaaS products are built with PHP due to its quick development cycle and extensive ecosystem, covering CRM, marketing automation, help-desk and analytics tools.

Why hire with us

Immediate access to vetted PHP expertise

Reduced recruitment and onboarding time

Lower total cost compared with full-time hires

Scalable team size based on project needs

Faster time-to-market for new features

Access to the latest PHP frameworks and best practices

Flexibility to engage talent only when required

Provider handles HR, payroll, and compliance overhead

Risk mitigation through service-level agreements and oversight

Knowledge transfer to strengthen in-house capabilities

What core skills should I prioritize when hiring a PHP developer?

Look for strong knowledge of modern PHP (7/8), object-oriented programming, experience with a mainstream framework such as Laravel or Symfony, familiarity with Composer, RESTful API design, unit testing, SQL/NoSQL databases, Git, and an understanding of security best practices (input validation, prepared statements, CSRF protection). Soft skills like communication and problem-solving are equally important.

How can I effectively assess a candidate’s experience with modern PHP frameworks like Laravel or Symfony?

Ask candidates to walk through a recent project built on their preferred framework, probe into why they chose specific design patterns, and request a short pair-programming task or code review of an open-source snippet. Practical discussions around routing, middleware, migrations, and dependency injection will reveal real-world proficiency.

What is the typical salary range for a mid-level PHP developer?

In the U.S. market (2024), mid-level PHP developers typically earn $80k–$110k annually, depending on location, industry, and the breadth of their tech stack. Remote roles, high-cost cities, and positions requiring full-stack expertise can push compensation toward the upper end or beyond it.

Should a PHP developer also know front-end technologies?

While not strictly mandatory, familiarity with HTML5, CSS, JavaScript, and a front-end framework (React, Vue, or Angular) lets a PHP developer collaborate smoothly on full-stack projects, build reusable API endpoints, and debug end-to-end issues. It’s a strong plus for small teams or SaaS startups where roles overlap.

How do I evaluate a PHP candidate’s coding standards and security awareness?

Use a short technical assignment that focuses on writing clean, PSR-compliant code, enforcing SOLID principles, and addressing common security pitfalls. During interviews, discuss their approach to automated testing, code reviews, static analysis tools, and how they stay current with the OWASP Top 10.