PHP developers
Rates, hiring difficulty, a hiring guide and interview questions for a PHP developer: everything in one place.
Overview
PHP developers build web applications and content management systems. Modern PHP (8.x) is a dramatically different language from its reputation — with type safety, enums, fibers, and frameworks like Laravel that rival anything in the ecosystem. PHP powers 77% of websites with known server-side languages, including WordPress, which runs 40%+ of the web.
Hiring PHP developers is competitive. The talent pool is large but so is demand, so senior people get snapped up quickly.
Retention: 34% of developers who use PHP want to keep using it, and 1% of those who do not use it yet want to start.
Open roles per 1,000 developers Full ranking →
US job postings (30 days) divided by developers who use each stack. Higher means harder to hire.
What a PHP developer costs
Contract and salary benchmarks for the US.
Contract rate
C2C or 1099, from W-2 hourly × 1.3–1.6 for tax, benefits and overhead.
W-2 equivalent
BLS median for US software developers ($135,980), adjusted -16% for PHP using Stack Overflow 2025 pay data (473 respondents).
Full-time contractor cost
Per year at 40 hours a week.
Agencies typically bill 2–3× W-2 pay. See what a full project costs, compare W-2, 1099 and C2C, or check rates by state.
How to hire a PHP developer
What good looks like, and what should worry you.
Typical projects
- Laravel application development
- WordPress custom theme and plugin development
- E-commerce with WooCommerce or Magento
- API development with Laravel or Symfony
- Legacy PHP application modernization
Team setup
PHP developers are the most cost-effective hires for web applications — the talent pool is large and rates are competitive. For a Laravel project, a senior PHP developer can lead 2-3 juniors effectively because Laravel's conventions reduce architectural decisions. For WordPress projects, hire WordPress-specific developers — general PHP developers often struggle with WordPress's hook-based architecture. Don't mix WordPress developers with application developers unless they have both skill sets.
What to look for
- Modern PHP knowledge: PHP 8.x features (enums, named arguments, fibers, readonly properties)
- Framework expertise in Laravel or Symfony — raw PHP for web apps is a red flag in 2026
- Understands Composer and proper dependency management
- Can write type-safe PHP with strict_types, return types, and union types
- Testing with PHPUnit or Pest, including database testing
Red flags
- Writes PHP like it's 2010 — no namespaces, no autoloading, inline SQL queries
- WordPress-only experience when you need application development (and vice versa)
- No understanding of security: SQL injection, XSS, CSRF — PHP's history makes this critical
- Can't discuss deployment beyond FTP uploads
- Dismisses PHP's modern capabilities — they're not keeping up with the language
Interview questions
Questions that separate strong candidates from people who just list the keyword.
- What's changed in PHP 8.x that affects how you write code? Which features do you use daily?
- How do you structure a Laravel application beyond the default scaffolding? Actions, services, repositories — what patterns do you use?
- Walk me through your approach to database migrations and schema management in a team environment.
- How do you handle authentication and authorization in Laravel? Compare built-in tools vs custom implementations.
- A page is loading in 8 seconds. Walk me through how you'd diagnose and fix the performance issue.
Hiring trend
How often PHP appears in startup hiring posts over time.
Hacker News “Who’s Hiring” posts mentioning PHP, by year (2015–Feb 2025). Peak: 2017 with 452 posts. HN hiring overall has fallen since 2019, so compare stacks rather than reading absolute numbers. Its share of current US job postings changed -23% since April 2026.
Similar stacks
Related skills, with their rates and hiring difficulty.
Need PHP developers?
We take on contract PHP work, from one developer joining your team to building the whole product. Tell us what you need and we'll reply by email.
- MVPs and new products
- Developers for your existing team
- Rescuing stalled projects
- AI features
Questions
How much does a PHP developer cost?
Contract PHP developers typically bill $72–88/hr (C2C or 1099). The W-2 equivalent salary is about $114,900. Agencies usually charge 2–3× W-2 pay.
Is it hard to hire PHP developers?
PHP is rated High on our hiring difficulty index (71/100, #10 of 29), with about 26 open US roles for every 1,000 developers who use it.
Should I hire a full-time PHP developer or use a contractor?
If the work is ongoing and core to your product, hire. If you need to start quickly, cover a gap, or the role is hard to fill, a contractor or agency gets work moving while you search.