Choosing the Right PHP Framework for Your Project

“Do I even need a PHP framework?”

If you’re reading this article, you probably already know what a software framework is – it’s basically a collection of libraries that speed up development by providing tried and tested solutions to typical problems. However, when it comes to choosing the right framework, this question is far from basic. And choosing the right framework for the right reasons is important. After all, you would not want to build your whole project on the wrong foundation, would you?

So, you find yourself at a crossroads, tasked with the challenge of building a web application using PHP as your programming language. Congratulations, by the way, you are in good company! Over 75% of all web sites are built on PHP, including Facebook.com, Wikipedia.org, and Ebay.com. But which framework is right for your project? Your choice will influence the work of everyone involved in the development and support, potentially for years to come, so, no pressure!

“What about using proprietary libraries?”

Maybe your company developed a proprietary framework, or you are considering using some of your own libraries. Custom-made frameworks might seem enticing, but consider this:

Developers report spending 75% of their time trying to understand existing code.
69% of software engineers stay at their job for only 2 years or less.

It's highly likely that your team will require the addition of new developers, and the process of finding adequately qualified engineers to join your team and subsequently onboarding them to your proprietary framework could become a real challenge. Opting for a well-established and widely recognized framework thus greatly simplifies things for everyone.

“What are my choices, then?”

"But which framework should I choose, then?" you might ask. "There are just so many of them: Laravel, CodeIgniter, Symfony, CakePHP, Yii, Slim, Phalcon, FuelPHP, PHPixie, Zend..."

In this article, I will help you make an informed choice between Laravel and Symfony, two of the most prominent PHP frameworks.

“But why these two?”

Before we jump into the details, let's address the elephant in the room – using framework’s popularity as the primary criterion for making a choice:

Popularity: Laravel takes the lead as the most popular framework, followed by Symfony with a significant margin, leaving other frameworks trailing behind.
Simplified Support: Popular frameworks benefit from extensive documentation and rigorous testing, along with a wealth of plugins, streamlining both development and support.
Easy Team Expansion: As large-scale projects inevitably welcome new developers, opting for a widely recognized framework eases the hiring process. A broader pool of qualified candidates is readily available, capable of contributing effectively from day one. Moreover, even if you are willing to provide a learning period, many developers will not see studying an obscure framework as a good investment of their time and effort, career-wise.

“Maybe I should just toss a coin? ... ”

You might be curious at this point – if both Laravel and Symfony enjoy such popularity, what truly sets them apart? Is it a matter of personal preference or perhaps akin to a developer's "holy war" – like the tabs vs. spaces debate or the best way to describe commits? Is one considered older, while the other is perceived as more modern? Or perhaps, is one wrapped in glamour and a higher price tag, while the other... But wait, that is for a totally different article I was planning.

Fact is, both frameworks have everything you need for web development. But it’s not the gist of this article, I promise! In fact, I bring to the table an intimate understanding of the architecture, strengths, and limitations of both frameworks. With this knowledge, I'm delighted to save you hours of research by offering a concise summary right here. If you're in a hurry, feel free to jump ahead, but I recommend bookmarking this page. The insights I provide might prove invaluable when it comes to justifying your choice to fellow developers or your esteemed CTO.

Laravel vs Symfony: A Closer Look

Although Laravel uses some components of Symfony, their current architectures are very different. Let’s delve into the specific similarities and distinctions between these two PHP frameworks.

Major Similarities

Open-Source Nature: Both Symfony and Laravel are freely available and open-source, making them accessible to developers without any licensing constraints.
MVC Architecture: Laravel and Symfony, like most contemporary frameworks, adhere to the Model-View-Controller (MVC) architectural pattern.
Testing Integration: Both frameworks seamlessly integrate with PHPUnit, a widely adopted testing framework in the PHP ecosystem.

Minor Differences

Extensibility: Both Laravel and Symfony offer a high degree of extensibility. You will rarely encounter situations where extending or replacing existing functionality is impossible, thanks to the frameworks’ modularity and flexibility. Both frameworks employ a system of plugins (called Packages in Laravel and Bundles in Symfony), providing ample opportunities for extending functionality with pre-built plugins and modular development.
- In Laravel, the process of building and configuring plugins is quite simple, whereas Symfony provides greater versatility and flexibility, albeit with a slightly higher level of complexity.
Debugging and Code Generation: Both frameworks provide a debugging web interface. They also offer console commands for generating basic classes.
- Symfony goes further by providing additional console commands for tasks like debugging of validation and of the Dependency Injection Container.
Database Schema Migration: Both frameworks support database schema migration for the initial project setup and incremental updates.
- Laravel accomplishes this exclusively through PHP code.
- Symfony allows auto generation of migrations using available metadata, simplifying and automating the process.
Dependency Injection Container: Both Laravel and Symfony leverage a Dependency Injection Container (DIC) to manage dependencies.
- Configuring the DIC in Laravel is straightforward, offering ease of use.
- Symfony's DIC configuration is more intricate but offers greater flexibility, allowing for finely-tuned dependency management.
Routing: Both frameworks offer routing capabilities, and the request and response classes are quite similar. Laravel's classes are actually derived from corresponding Symfony classes.
- In Laravel, routing is configured solely through configuration files.
- Symfony goes a step further by allowing the use of PHP 8 attributes on controller methods for routing in addition to configuration files.
Templating System and REST API: Both Laravel and Symfony provide templating systems, known as Blade in Laravel and Twig in Symfony. However, in modern development, the de facto standard often leans toward RESTful APIs, where templates are not used.
- Laravel includes basic adaptation for REST APIs.
- With Symfony, you can use API Platform, a powerful separate framework designed specifically for building flexible and functional APIs.

Major Differences

Configuration Options:
- Laravel utilizes PHP arrays as configuration files. It also employs service providers to manage services within the dependency container.
- In contrast, Symfony offers a variety of configuration options, including PHP code, PHP class/method attributes, YAML files, and even XML files. While Symfony's configuration might appear more complex, it grants unparalleled flexibility. Unlike Laravel, Symfony also embraces the use of attributes introduced in PHP 8, enhancing conciseness and placing information exactly where it is semantically suitable. Symfony's architecture aligns with the Single Responsibility principle and encourages developers to follow suit.
HTTP Request Handling:
- Laravel employs a middleware pipeline pattern to handle HTTP requests. This pattern is not limited to request processing but can also be used for various other sequential data processing tasks. Middleware is employed for preprocessing tasks like authorization, request frequency limitation, input data pre-validation, and post-processing tasks like logging and adding metadata.
- In Symfony, similar results are achieved through the event model, where listeners are subscribed to corresponding kernel events, facilitating similar processing tasks.
Access to Dependency Container:
- Laravel simplifies access to basic service methods in the dependency container through Helpers (special-purpose functions) and Facades (classes with static methods). At first glance, the code written this way may seem easy to read and understand, but as the complexity of the project grows, the connections between classes get less explicit, and the code's simplicity can become deceiving.
- Symfony, on the other hand, offers neither the extra flexibility nor the potential for bad coding practices.
Data Validation:
- Laravel restricts data validation to arrays, often using Form Request to validate data from the outset.
- Symfony provides a wealth of validation options. For example, you can validate objects using attributes, where the properties' attributes define the validation rules, allowing validation at the most appropriate stage.
Entity and Data Storage. One of the most significant differences lies in the approach to managing entities and their storage, typically a database:
- Laravel employs Eloquent, which follows the Active Record pattern. This approach combines data and logic in a single entity class, including database connection, save/delete methods, and lifecycle event handlers. The same entity class is used to configure the result of the toArray method, serving as the default data output format.
- Symfony uses Doctrine, implementing the Data Mapper pattern which separates data storage interaction logic into a distinct layer. Interconnections between models can be configured using attributes or configuration files. The conversion between Entity objects and arrays, both for data storage interactions and client interactions, is also isolated in a separate layer.

Choosing Between Laravel and Symfony

As I mentioned earlier, both frameworks cover all the fundamental functionalities. However, if your project relies on particularly specialized databases or services, it's advisable to verify the availability and quality of the required integrations. If this isn't the scenario you're facing, do read on!

When Laravel Shines:

Laravel is an excellent choice for developing relatively small-scale projects quickly. It is also well-suited for creating microservices with limited context, where the codebase won't be extensively shared by other microservices.
Laravel's core functionality is concise and beginner-friendly.
The Laravel community is vast, offering an abundance of resources. You can tap into a large developer community, access numerous websites, take courses, and leverage a wide array of packages. This extensive ecosystem ensures you can find answers to almost any question you may encounter during development.

Symfony boasts a respectable community and offers documentation that, while informative, leans toward conciseness. Novice developers may encounter challenges in grasping the framework's intricacies, finding it comparatively complex and daunting. As a result, they might confront more intricate questions and encounter greater difficulty in locating comprehensive solutions. Lack of experience could also lead to suboptimal programming decisions.

When Symfony Takes the Lead:

Symfony is the preferred option for complex, large, long-lasting projects with high-performance requirements. Its design places a stronger emphasis on flexibility and optimization. It actively employs code autogeneration and caching, especially effective when the PHP opcache is enabled. This approach ensures that Symfony is well-suited for projects that demand top-tier performance and a well-thought-out architecture.

Laravel's internal implementation is not optimized for high-performance requirements. For instance, accessing any property of an entity in Laravel involves invoking type conversions (casts and mutators) between the internal and external data representation. This design choice, while simplifying basic scenarios, can introduce performance bottlenecks in high-load projects. In a nutshell, Laravel prioritizes simplifying fundamental scenarios to enhance their accessibility and comprehensibility. However, this emphasis on simplicity can come at the cost of performance and flexibility.
Additionally, while many developers commence their projects with Laravel, a natural and sound choice, they often find themselves unsatisfied with Laravel's Active Record model as the project matures. This discontent typically results in developers writing their own modifications, including the addition of extra layers for database interactions, and more. Interestingly, many Laravel communities advocate these customizations as best practices. However, I assert that this practice is somewhat counterproductive because developers find themselves writing copious amounts of additional code to compensate for the features that Laravel lacks. Given that each developer possesses unique code-writing styles and preferences, this situation reintroduces the abovementioned challenges typically associated with custom-written frameworks.

Challenges of Switching to Symfony:

Popular opinion and community support can influence decisions. Many developers initially gravitate towards Laravel due to its large and active community.
Convincing stakeholders, including the CTO, to switch to Symfony can be a daunting task. It often involves a change in the established workflow and might require a strong case to justify the transition.
The development team may need time to acquire the necessary skills and adapt to Symfony.
In situations where time is of the essence, the company may prioritize project completion over long-term considerations, leading to the continued use of Laravel.

Conclusion

In the world of software development, there's no one-size-fits-all answer when it comes to architectural choices. Software development is a craft, and the best architecture for your project is the one that makes the development process more flexible, manageable, and ultimately successful. There is no universally perfect framework, and the decision should be driven by the specific needs of your team and the project at hand.

That being said, when project complexity and team preferences necessitate an architecture with multiple layers that aligns with the Single Responsibility principle, Symfony emerges as the right choice. The Laravel vs. Symfony decision often boils down to a classic trade-off between a swift, straightforward solution that may become cumbersome as the project scales, and a solution that demands more initial time and effort but rewards with reduced complexity and costs in the long run.

Interestingly, Symfony shares a number of patterns with Java Spring, a framework that embodies many modern approaches and trends in software development. By exploring Symfony, developers have the opportunity to gain insights into contemporary programming practices and enhance their overall skills in application architecture design.

In some cases, practical constraints, project deadlines, and the preferences of the development team might necessitate sticking with Laravel, even for larger-scale projects. While Symfony may offer long-term benefits, the decision ultimately depends on your specific project requirements, your organization's willingness to adapt, and the experience and preferences of your development team. It's a decision that should be carefully evaluated based on your project's unique circumstances.

In the end, regardless of the framework you select, the ultimate goal is to produce code that is free of bugs, lightning-fast, and easily comprehensible. May your development endeavors be both successful and satisfying, no matter the path you choose!

Laravel vs Symfony: An Architect’s Perspective