The final version of PHP 7.3 is closely approaching, and nothing excites us more than new software! Why? Because with almost every new release of PHP there have been performance improvements. This time around it’s not as significant of a jump as 5.6 to 7.0, or 7.1 to 7.2, but early benchmarks show that PHP 7.3 is about 5% faster than PHP 7.2. Who doesn’t love a free speed boost?

We want to give everyone as much time as possible to test custom code, third-party plugins, and themes. Therefore, PHP 7.3-RC4 is now available for testing. 🤘

Please note that this is a pre-release version of PHP 7.3 and not the final release. Test thoroughly before using it on a production site.

Start Testing PHP 7.3-RC4

The easiest way to start testing is to create a staging environment as this will closely resemble your live production site. In the MyKinsta dashboard click into your site and change the environment over to staging.

WordPress staging environment
WordPress staging environment

Then under the “Tools” menu change your PHP engine over to PHP 7.3 (Beta).

Change to PHP 7.3 RC 4
Change to PHP 7.3-RC4

Once we release the final version of PHP, you can follow the same steps. After testing, you can then change your production site over to PHP 7.3 or push your staging site to live.

If you’re curious about all of the other changes, check out our in-depth blog post on what’s new with PHP 7.3.