The market winner, PHP covering more than 75% of the internet market. PHP has given birth to many frameworks with varied functional features, security, efficiency, user interface, in this way making it typical for programmers to choose the best from the big list of available options for them based on the competency and needs of the project.

There are dozens of PHP frameworks available in the market today, the selection of which has much power and impact in terms of quality, it is essential to deploy only the best as per your business needs.

Having proved its performance and power housing the most renowned web applications such as Yahoo, BBC America, Facebook Newsroom, Wikipedia!, without any doubt, it is proved that PHP itself is the best for any kind of web development. But the discussion has transferred to other frameworks or components. 

With the 4 more renowned and highly popular PHP frameworks that are Codeigniter, CakePHP, Yii, Laravel on the scale, the debate here is which one will win the race between these 4. 

Before going ahead on comparing each framework, it is essential to know that all these frameworks are very successful and efficient and have proved their functionality in multiple projects. But there are some basic differences, and we will elaborate on their unique strengths and attributes and what makes them different from others.

CakePHP PHP Framework

It is an open-source PHP framework which utilizes the MVC i.e. Model-View-Controller model for web development. CakePHP has been utilized broadly by Fortune 500 IT companies such as Corel, Cisco and other organizations such as anti-virus developers BitDefender, men’s fashion magazine Men’s Health and car dealership autotrader.com. Companies using this framework for PHP, and also its concept that is RoR (Ruby on Rails) and has garnered praise for its extensibility as well as simplicity.

Advantages of CakePHP:

• Offers great user management and bespoke templates features for fast coding and scalability.
• It is programmed on Object Relation Modal makes it easier to develop SQL queries and fetch their results on Server Side.
• It supports a wide range of languages and database options with efficient file management capability.

Laravel

As per Google Trends, Laravel is the most and best-used framework. It is an open-source and free framework and has covered the web-arena at a rapid rate. It is a PHP-based framework and will assist you to develop complex and large web applications. For Laravel development projects, you only need to install PHP and a text editor to start your project. 

Laravel speeds up the whole development process and offers highly secured and authentic tools and lets dynamic utilization all around. It is not similar like those CMS or eCommerce frameworks which will meet your project needs. However, Laravel is still an all-rounder. With Laravel, you can develop, you can code perfectly working CMS or eCommerce web applications.

Advantage of Laravel:

• It offers easy customization for coding and makes it much more stress-free and offers elegant security and functionality. 
• Laravel provides top community support and in PHP it is known as one of the human logic frameworks.
• It is packed with different features for easy integration to web developments simplifying environment for coders with modular packaging systems. 
• Yes, it is robotic! Laravel provides an auto-loading feature which doesn’t need manual inclusion and produces URL automatically relied on the path.

YII 

It is a lightweight framework. Yii assists in creating a faster website as it utilizes the lazy loading method. Yii is equipped with powerful caching features such as DB based page, XCache, APC and segment caching.

Advantage of Yii:

• Easy way to create the modules.
• An easy technique to develop the components and extensions.
• Simple configuration for the applications from start to end.
• Yii offers huge improvements in the performance of developed applications.
• It is highly compatible with 3rd party codes.
• The products developed with Yii framework as high efficient, robust, scalable, extensible and maintainable.
• It performs better functionality than other platforms as far as it receives several requests per second.

CodeIgniter

Codeigniter is one of the most popular and usable frameworks that serve you with all the required functional features and the easy way to develop a web project using PHP. The features offered by Codeigniter assist developers to create reliable web applications with much ease. With a framework like Codeigniter, the programmer can select, reach and deploy various anthologies from varied code compositions.

If we look at some of the other features then these features make it stand out from the big array of available frameworks. These features are intuitive UI, compatibility with PHP 4 and PHP 5, fully-modular codebase, Customizable Admin Interface, MVC based architecture support among others.

What makes this framework so different from other similar tools? It is equipped with a rich set of libraries that provide a big collection of features and code events. The perfect suit of development functionalities within its environment let the users deploy these featured codes diligently, without any configuration, moreover leveraging its utility. Its simple interface and easy-to-use system components help the seamless and swift environment.

Advantages of CodeIgniter:

• CodeIgniter is free from complex development procedures with amazing presentation and need no essential coding rules. Totally direct solution.
• The presentation layer is extensive, lightweight and smooth with unique debugging features and quick in performance as compared to others.
• New functionality and Effortless Active Record implementation adding with the customization and easy handling.
• With smart Object-Oriented Capabilities, it supports Relational Database Management with the type of operating system and web servers.

Which one is the best? Which one to Choose?

After evaluating CakePHP vs Laravel vs Codeigniter vs Yii, can be concluded that all these frameworks have their advantages. So, before making the selection for any framework, developers must know and examine different factors and features of all the 4 frameworks. Because when we talk about the technologies and tools, then selection becomes very typical. Final selection largely relies on the needs of your project. 

So, some points can help you make the right selection:

If security and performance are your basic concerns then choose Yii for profitable results. 

If you have large applications with complex functionalities and an extensive list of features then choose CakePHP.

For a rapid development with minimum coding and easy maintenance, Codeigniter is a good option to meet your needs.

If you are seeking for anything dedicated but having them all in a single project then Laravel is the best choice that can offer you almost everything you need.

Author Bio

NIKUNJ SHINGALA

Nikunj Shingala is a CEO and co-founder at Webs Optimization Software Solution which is successfully delivering services in the realm of UI/UX design, web development, mobile app development, and enterprise solution. He’s enthusiastic blogger and his writing interest includes mobile and web development technologies, startup ideas and strategies.