PHP 5.4+ comes with a built-in development server. It can be used to run applications without having to install a production HTTP server such as nginx or Apache. The built-in server is only designed to be used for development and testing purposes.

It can be started by using the -S flag:

php -S <host/ip>:<port>

Example usage

1. Create an index.php file containing:

   <?php
   echo "Hello World from built-in PHP server";
2. Run the command php -S localhost:8080 from the command line. Do not include http://. This will start a web server listening on port 8080 using the current directory that you are in as the document root.
3. Open the browser and navigate to http://localhost:8080. You should see your “Hello World” page.

Configuration

To override the default document root (i.e. the current directory), use the -t flag:

php -S <host/ip>:<port> -t <directory>

E.g. if you have a public/ directory in your project you can serve your project from that directory using php -S localhost:8080 -t public/.

Logs

Every time a request is made from the development server, a log entry like the one below is written to the command line.

[Mon Aug 15 18:20:19 2016] ::1:52455 [200]: /