PhpStorm vs Visual Studio Code

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PhpStorm vs Visual Studio Code: What are the differences?

PHPStorm and Visual Studio Code are widely used code editors for web development. PHPStorm is a specialized IDE for PHP development, while Visual Studio Code (VS Code) is a lightweight and versatile code editor that supports multiple programming languages.

  1. Language Support: PHPStorm is specifically designed for PHP development and provides extensive language support for PHP, including code completion, refactoring, and debugging features tailored to PHP projects. VS Code, on the other hand, supports a wide range of programming languages out-of-the-box, including PHP, JavaScript, HTML, CSS, and more, making it suitable for multi-language development projects.

  2. User Interface: PHPStorm offers a feature-rich and customizable user interface that is optimized for PHP development workflows. It provides specialized tools and panels for PHP-specific tasks, such as integrated database tools and version control integration. VS Code features a clean and minimalistic user interface that can be easily customized and extended through a rich ecosystem of extensions.

  3. Integrated Development Environment (IDE) Features: PHPStorm is a comprehensive IDE with advanced features tailored for PHP development. It includes built-in support for frameworks, seamless integration with build tools, and powerful debugging capabilities. It also offers code analysis, unit testing, and deployment tools specific to PHP. On the other hand, VS Code, while not as feature-rich as PHPStorm, can be enhanced with extensions to provide similar functionality and capabilities.

  4. Debugging and Testing: PHPStorm provides comprehensive debugging and testing support specifically tailored for PHP applications. It offers debugging tools, unit testing frameworks integration, and profiling capabilities. VS Code also has debugging and testing support through extensions, but it may require additional configuration and setup compared to PHPStorm's built-in capabilities.

  5. Ecosystem and Extensions: PHPStorm has a rich ecosystem with a wide range of plugins and extensions specifically designed for PHP development. It provides seamless integration with popular PHP frameworks, libraries, and tools. VS Code, on the other hand, has a vast and active extension ecosystem that caters to developers across different programming languages, allowing for customization and adding functionality to meet specific development needs.

In summary, PHPStorm is a specialized IDE for PHP development with robust language support, advanced debugging, and seamless integration with PHP frameworks. It offers a feature-rich and customizable interface. In contrast, VS Code is a lightweight code editor supporting multiple languages. It has a clean interface, extensive extension support, and the flexibility to work with different languages and frameworks. While PHPStorm excels in PHP development with advanced IDE features, VS Code provides broader language support and a thriving extension ecosystem.

Advice on PhpStorm and Visual Studio Code
Johnny Bell

When I switched to Visual Studio Code 12 months ago from PhpStorm I was in love, it was great. However after using VS Code for a year, I see myself switching back and forth between WebStorm and VS Code. The VS Code plugins are great however I notice Prettier, auto importing of components and linking to the definitions often break, and I have to restart VS Code multiple times a week and sometimes a day.

We use Ruby here so I do like that Visual Studio Code highlights that for me out of the box, with WebStorm I'd need to probably also install RubyMine and have 2 IDE's going at the same time.

Should I stick with Visual Studio Code, or switch to something else? #help

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Replies (15)
Erik Ostrom
Recommends
on
RubyMineRubyMine

If you're working with both Ruby and JavaScript, buy RubyMine and shut down the other two. It's much better for Ruby than Visual Studio Code is. It can also do everything WebStorm does, if you install the plugins you need from JetBrains, and they all work together nicely.

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Marc Swikull
Recommends
on
RubyMineRubyMine

If you install RubyMine, you shouldn't need WebStorm, as all the functionality of WebStorm appears to be included in RubyMine. (See here: https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/a/132950).

I've used PhpStorm for several years and have never needed to open (or even download) WebStorm for anything front-end or JavaScript related.

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Russel Werner
Lead Engineer at StackShare · | 6 upvotes · 259K views
Recommends
on
WebStormWebStorm
at

I work at the same company as you and I use WebStorm for 99% of my tasks. I also have RubyMine installed and use that when I have to tweak some backend code. I tried using RubyMine for JavaScript but was unhappy with how it felt and I believe that WebStorm is faster because it has less plugins and language extensions running. Summary: Buy and use WebStorm for primary development and keep VS Code around for when you have to touch Ruby.

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Danny Battison
Recommends
on
PhpStormPhpStorm

JetBrains all the way - my entire team uses PhpStorm and none of us would even consider switching.

The availability of IDEs for other languages along with consistency in environment and keyboard shortcuts is also a godsend, which is the reason I'd also choose Rider over Visual Studio (but also VS for Mac is trash, but I digress...)

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Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

I've never had much issue running multiple IDEs and generally pick them based on the languages they best support. For front end work where I mainly use TypeScript, I stick heavily with Visual Studio Code. However, for backend work which we do primarily in Python, PyCharm is my go-to editor. The one thing that I do however is I do remap keyboard shortcuts so I get consistent keyboard ability even when I switch IDEs.

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Recommends
on
PhpStormPhpStorm

So here is the deal man, bottom line you want to write code. All of these tools are built in a mouse-driven world, they are designed not for engineers, but office monkeys. If you want a real workflow that gives you ultimate performance, customization and speed you need to use a modal editor, I suggest NeoVim. Start using it 20% of the time on single file edits, watch youtube videos about it and teach yourself vim gestures. It will infuriate you for 6 weeks, make you cry for another 2 months. But as you use it more, as long as your usage goes over 40% of the time, in 6 months you will understand why most of the world's too engineers use it. Settling on lesser editors out of laziness is exactly the attitude that results in shitty the engineering. Yeah it's hard. You're smart. You do hard things. Once it isn't hard anymore you will blow yourself away at how much more efficiently you edit files.

Also vim keybindings in a mouse driven editor does not cut it. Managing files, buffers and workflow is half of the value of vim/neovim. It is OK if you have to use an IDE (currently I only use an IDE for java development, so I have little choice)

So use VSCode while you teach yourself vim.

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Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

If I have to choose one I would go with VS Code; it’s become pretty mature and keeps getting better. If those plugins are creating problems for you then just uninstall them, find an alternative, or make a PR to fix. But at the end of the day these are IDE’s and they are meant to save you time. I would go with whatever helps you develop code faster. If restarting VS code slows you down then make a switch, that personally would annoying the crap out of me. Else maybe it’s a quick restart, not the end of the word, hopefully someone will fix at some point.

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Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

Visual Studio Code is a text editor. And this is best option in my opinion. For Ruby, I cannot say how VS Code is good. If you wanna choose IDE, RubyMine should fit your needs. Because IDEs are more compatible with major needs. But text editors are just text editor. You can do same things with also text editors. I recommend to try both VS Code and RubyMine. And you will be able to find which fits better for your needs

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Recommends
at

Visiual Studio is the best

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Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

If you find something that works and are comfortable with it, stay with it. Changing IDE's and learning their idiosyncrasies takes valuable time away from programming while learning setups and keyboard short cuts. I personally use VS Code for cost and decent multiple language support. I've had issues occasionally with it locking up, but it is under heavy development and continually improving. I have also found it more intuitive for new programmers. ** Having profiles for different languages can reduce the amount of plugins running and issues they can cause.

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Kyle Schoonover
Senior Software Engineer at Nordstrom · | 2 upvotes · 221.8K views
Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

I'm personally a Visual Studio Code fan. I've used it for both Go and Java. It really depends on the quality and support of the plugins. Typically VS Code doesn't crash as much as a bad plugin causes an unforeseen error. Make sure you stay up to date and look at alternative plugins.

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Recommends
on
PhpStormPhpStorm

I usually have both running but do the bulk of my language work in the appropriate JetBrains flavor. One thing to watch out for in VS is that under the hood it is running the tools needed for whatever language you are working with. This is where tools like JetBrains shine. While I am sure you can tune the heck out of what you use in VS, the provides context and clarity...

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Lungu Alexandru-Mihai
Recommends
on
VimVim

Well you can try for a while MacVim because it is already configured with tons of plugins. My favourite text editors are Sublime Text and TextMate which are lightweight and speedy. My feeling is that JetBrains IDEs are making you brainless.

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Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

Are you using the prettier-vscode VSCode extension or prettier via prettier-eslint? The prettier-vscode extension recommends you...

Use prettier-eslint instead of prettier. Other settings will only be fallbacks in case they could not be inferred from ESLint rules.

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Recommends

An integrated development environment software with huge potential in the future is VS Code. So I would personally say you can use VS code.

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Decisions about PhpStorm and Visual Studio Code
Kamaleshwar BN
Senior Software Engineer at Pulley · | 12 upvotes · 1.3M views

Visual Studio Code became famous over the past 3+ years I believe. The clean UI, easy to use UX and the plethora of integrations made it a very easy decision for us. Our gripe with Sublime was probably only the UX side. VSCode has not failed us till now, and still is able to support our development env without any significant effort.

Goland being paid, as well as built only for Go seemed like a significant limitation to not consider it.

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Dennis Ziolkowski

PhpStorm has all the integrations you need to build cool PHP Applications. This starts from it's super helpful integrated IntelliSense to the composer-support over much more integrated developer tools, such as git, ToDo-Lists and database connections. I also like the material design you can use with a plugin.

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Simon Ibssa
Student at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo · | 2 upvotes · 1.2M views

I decided to choose VSCode over Sublime text for my Systems Programming class in C. What I love about VSCode is its awesome ability to add extensions. Intellisense is a beautiful debugger, and Remote SSH allows me to login and make real-time changes in VSCode to files on my university server. This is an awesome alternative to going back and forth on pushing/pulling code and logging into servers in the terminal. Great choice for anyone interested in C programming!

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Pros of PhpStorm
Pros of Visual Studio Code
  • 287
    Best ide for php
  • 232
    Easy to use
  • 218
    Functionality
  • 166
    Plugins
  • 160
    Code analysis
  • 87
    Integrated version control
  • 76
    Great php ide for mac
  • 73
    All-round php ide
  • 62
    Local history
  • 53
    Themes
  • 18
    Best PHP IDE
  • 11
    Database control
  • 10
    Easy to find anything and everything in your code
  • 9
    Best bebugging
  • 9
    Best inspection variable
  • 7
    Command line integration
  • 7
    Great frameworks integration
  • 7
    PHPUnit integration
  • 7
    Getting Better
  • 7
    UX
  • 6
    Composer integration
  • 6
    Performance
  • 6
    Coolest IDE
  • 5
    Real time code validation
  • 5
    Easy to use and github interaction
  • 5
    Neat does the job and easy
  • 5
    Best ide for advanced php and symfony
  • 4
    Best ide for php
  • 4
    TypeScript support
  • 4
    Code indexing
  • 4
    It has no match. it filled one of the biggest void
  • 4
    Fast and relevant auto-complete
  • 4
    Great refactoring support
  • 4
    Cross platform
  • 3
    Integration with Vagrant and Docker
  • 3
    Debugger for Javascript
  • 3
    Good
  • 3
    Very good
  • 2
    Debugging in the Just-In-Time Mode
  • 2
    Perfect locahost / host sync
  • 2
    Awesome debugging features
  • 339
    Powerful multilanguage IDE
  • 308
    Fast
  • 193
    Front-end develop out of the box
  • 158
    Support TypeScript IntelliSense
  • 142
    Very basic but free
  • 126
    Git integration
  • 106
    Intellisense
  • 78
    Faster than Atom
  • 53
    Better ui, easy plugins, and nice git integration
  • 45
    Great Refactoring Tools
  • 44
    Good Plugins
  • 42
    Terminal
  • 38
    Superb markdown support
  • 36
    Open Source
  • 34
    Extensions
  • 26
    Large & up-to-date extension community
  • 26
    Awesome UI
  • 24
    Powerful and fast
  • 22
    Portable
  • 18
    Best editor
  • 18
    Best code editor
  • 17
    Easy to get started with
  • 15
    Lots of extensions
  • 15
    Built on Electron
  • 15
    Crossplatform
  • 15
    Good for begginers
  • 14
    Extensions for everything
  • 14
    Open, cross-platform, fast, monthly updates
  • 14
    All Languages Support
  • 13
    Easy to use and learn
  • 12
    Extensible
  • 12
    "fast, stable & easy to use"
  • 11
    Totally customizable
  • 11
    Git out of the box
  • 11
    Faster edit for slow computer
  • 11
    Ui design is great
  • 11
    Useful for begginer
  • 10
    Great community
  • 10
    SSH support
  • 10
    Fast Startup
  • 9
    It has terminal and there are lots of shortcuts in it
  • 9
    Powerful Debugger
  • 9
    Great language support
  • 9
    Works With Almost EveryThing You Need
  • 8
    Python extension is fast
  • 8
    Can compile and run .py files
  • 7
    Great document formater
  • 7
    Features rich
  • 6
    He is not Michael
  • 6
    Awesome multi cursor support
  • 6
    Extension Echosystem
  • 6
    She is not Rachel
  • 5
    Language server client
  • 5
    Easy azure
  • 5
    SFTP Workspace
  • 5
    VSCode.pro Course makes it easy to learn
  • 5
    Very proffesional
  • 4
    Supports lots of operating systems
  • 4
    Has better support and more extentions for debugging
  • 4
    Excellent as git difftool and mergetool
  • 4
    Virtualenv integration
  • 3
    Has more than enough languages for any developer
  • 3
    Better autocompletes than Atom
  • 3
    Emmet preinstalled
  • 3
    'batteries included'
  • 3
    More tools to integrate with vs
  • 2
    VS Code Server: Browser version of VS Code
  • 2
    Big extension marketplace
  • 2
    Customizable
  • 2
    Microsoft
  • 2
    Light
  • 2
    Fast and ruby is built right in
  • 2
    CMake support with autocomplete

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Cons of PhpStorm
Cons of Visual Studio Code
  • 14
    Uses a lot of memory
  • 10
    Does not open large files
  • 9
    Slow
  • 8
    Uses Java machine
  • 3
    No way to change syntax highlight for files without ext
  • 2
    No save prompt or asterisk on file change
  • 46
    Slow startup
  • 29
    Resource hog at times
  • 20
    Poor refactoring
  • 16
    Microsoft
  • 13
    Poor UI Designer
  • 11
    Weak Ui design tools
  • 10
    Poor autocomplete
  • 8
    Super Slow
  • 8
    Microsoft sends telemetry data
  • 7
    Poor in PHP
  • 7
    Huge cpu usage with few installed extension
  • 6
    It's MicroSoft
  • 3
    No built in live Preview
  • 3
    No Built in Browser Preview
  • 3
    Poor in Python
  • 3
    Electron
  • 3
    No color Intergrator
  • 3
    Very basic for java development and buggy at times
  • 2
    Powered by Electron
  • 2
    Bad Plugin Architecture
  • 1
    Terminal does not identify path vars sometimes
  • 1
    Slow C++ Language Server

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What is PhpStorm?

PhpStorm is a PHP IDE which keeps up with latest PHP & web languages trends, integrates a variety of modern tools, and brings even more extensibility with support for major PHP frameworks.

What is Visual Studio Code?

Build and debug modern web and cloud applications. Code is free and available on your favorite platform - Linux, Mac OSX, and Windows.

Need advice about which tool to choose?Ask the StackShare community!

What companies use PhpStorm?
What companies use Visual Studio Code?
See which teams inside your own company are using PhpStorm or Visual Studio Code.
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What tools integrate with PhpStorm?
What tools integrate with Visual Studio Code?

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What are some alternatives to PhpStorm and Visual Studio Code?
WebStorm
WebStorm is a lightweight and intelligent IDE for front-end development and server-side JavaScript.
Sublime Text
Sublime Text is available for OS X, Windows and Linux. One license is all you need to use Sublime Text on every computer you own, no matter what operating system it uses. Sublime Text uses a custom UI toolkit, optimized for speed and beauty, while taking advantage of native functionality on each platform.
DataGrip
A cross-platform IDE that is aimed at DBAs and developers working with SQL databases.
NetBeans IDE
NetBeans IDE is FREE, open source, and has a worldwide community of users and developers.
Eclipse
Standard Eclipse package suited for Java and plug-in development plus adding new plugins; already includes Git, Marketplace Client, source code and developer documentation. Click here to file a bug against Eclipse Platform.
See all alternatives