PhpStorm Light — experimental lightweight build — phpstorm.dev

Experimental

PhpStorm Light

A trimmed-down, experimental build of PhpStorm — faster startup, lower memory,<br>fewer bundled features. Try it and tell us what you think.

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Build 262.8702

Runs alongside other PhpStorm installs with its own settings — test it in parallel without conflicts

New app icon to tell it apart from other PhpStorm installs

Older builds ▾

262.8644 &middot; 2026-06-29

Faster startup: instant window on launch, smarter indexing order, fewer background checks

Smoother editing: lighter inspection profile, no per-file gutter scanning, Code Vision off

Cleaner UI: compact density, decluttered project tree, simplified right-click menus

Lighter footprint: on-demand database tools, several rarely-used plugins removed

262.8539 &middot; 2026-06-27

Initial PhpStorm Light experimental build

Watch us present PhpStorm Light — what we trimmed, what got faster, and why.

What is PhpStorm Light

This is an experimental build that starts in Light Mode by default: everything you use day<br>to day is still here, just with the heavy, slow parts trimmed and startup and indexing tuned<br>to get out of your way sooner.

It's not a reinvention — same PhpStorm, same engine — an early experiment we're actively<br>working on, and the best parts we figure out here land in regular PhpStorm.

🚀 Faster startup

Instant window on launch — the editor appears immediately with a placeholder preview instead of an empty frame with spinners; the real editor takes over once it's ready.

Smarter indexing order — your PHP source files are indexed first and vendor/ last, so code intelligence in your own code lights up sooner.

Less startup busywork — watching of vendor/, Composer update checks, and plugin-update checks are deferred; the "updates available" check now runs when you open composer.json, not at startup.

No startup plugin nags — the IDE no longer scans your project on launch to advertise plugins; suggestions appear only when you open a matching file (e.g. opening vite.config.* suggests the Vite plugin).

Clearer indexing progress — indexing now shows how many files are left.

✏️ Smoother editing, fewer freezes

No more commit-dialog hang — "Analyze code" and "Check TODO" before commit are off by default, so committing large changesets no longer freezes the dialog (re-enable them in the commit dialog).

Lighter highlighting profile — a dedicated "PhpStorm Light" inspection profile runs fewer inspections as you type.

No per-file gutter scanning — the PHP "extends / implements / overrides" gutter icons are off, skipping a class-hierarchy search on every file you open.

Code Vision off — the usages / inheritors / code-author inlays above declarations are disabled.

Generated files skipped — single-file artifacts like *.phar.php (e.g. installers) are excluded from indexing.

Smart Mode toggle — replaces "Power Save Mode" with a Light-Mode-aware switch that controls how much background analysis runs.

🧹 Cleaner, more focused UI

Compact UI density and breadcrumbs off by default.

The top-right inspection widget is hidden; the status bar is trimmed to the essentials (PHP language level + Smart Mode).

Rendered-documentation view and its gutter icon are off; "Open in Browser" editor icons are hidden on PHP and HTML/template files.

Decluttered Project tree — expand/collapse chevrons, Scratches and Consoles are hidden, and External Libraries moves to the view selector.

Simplified right-click menus in the Project and Commit/Changes views — a short, curated set of actions plus an "Open In" submenu, with the full menu still under "More…".

🪶 Lighter footprint

Database tools load on demand — instead of starting up with the IDE, they activate the first time you use a database feature.

Composer in a terminal tab — Composer commands run in a terminal tab so you can see and reuse the output.

Rarely-used plugins off or removed — CMS integrations (WordPress, Joomla, Drupal), some front-end frameworks (Angular, Vue, React, Vite, Webpack), BDD/test frameworks (Behat, Codeception, PHPSpec), Smarty, UML diagrams, Vagrant, Perforce, grammar checking, time tracking, and several others. Core PHP, Blade, Twig, and the common Laravel/Symfony workflows stay intact.

Found something broken?

This build lives or dies on your feedback. If something's missing, slow, or<br>crashing, file it — that's the whole point of an experimental build. Want to<br>talk it through first? Join the discussion on Discord.

Report on YouTrack →<br>Discuss on Discord →