How to Install PHP 8.3 on Ubuntu 24.04

This tutorial will teach you how to install PHP 8.3 on Ubuntu 24.04. PHP is a scripting language used for development purposes. It was an abbreviation for Personal Home Page, but now it stands for the recursive initialism known as PHP Hypertext Preprocessor. PHP is used for creating dynamic web pages, and according to the reports in 2024, PHP is used by 76% of all websites whose programming language can be determined. Most popular CMS systems like WordPress, Drupal, or Joomla are written in PHP. The latest stable version of PHP is PHP 8.3.

Installing PHP 8.3 and its extensions is straightforward and may take a few minutes. Let’s get started!

Prerequisites to install PHP 8.3 on Ubuntu 24.04

• A server running Ubuntu 24.04 or any Linux OS
• User privileges: root or non-root user with sudo privileges

Step 1. Update the system

We assume that you have a fresh installation of Ubuntu 24.04, and we need to update the system before we start installing PHP 8.3. To do that, execute the following commands:

sudo apt update -y && sudo apt upgrade -y

Step 2. Install PHP 8.3

Once the system is updated, we can install the latest stable version of PHP8.3. This version is, by default, enabled in the Ubuntu 24.04 repository, and we do not need to add any keys and repositories. The installation command is straightforward:

sudo apt install php8.3 -y

After successful installation, you can check the version of the PHP:

php -v

You should get the following output:

root@host:~# php -v
PHP 8.3.0-1ubuntu1 (cli) (built: Jan 19 2024 14:00:34) (NTS)
Copyright (c) The PHP Group
Zend Engine v4.3.0, Copyright (c) Zend Technologies
    with Zend OPcache v8.3.0-1ubuntu1, Copyright (c), by Zend Technologies

Step 3. Install PHP 8.3 extensions

Installation of the PHP itself will not run the websites smoothly. We need additional modules, such as PHP, to work with MySQL, with images, for HTTP requests, XML data, etc. In the next command, we will install a couple of PHP extensions that are very important for one website:

sudo apt install libapache2-mod-php php8.3-common php8.3-cli php8.3-mbstring php8.3-bcmath php8.3-fpm php8.3-mysql php8.3-zip php8.3-gd php8.3-curl php8.3-xml -y

After the installation, we can check the installed PHP modules with the command below:

php -m

We will get a long list of modules:

root@host:~# php -m
[PHP Modules]
bcmath
calendar
Core
ctype
curl
date
dom
exif
FFI
fileinfo
filter
ftp
gd
gettext
hash
iconv
json
libxml
mbstring
mysqli
 .
 .
 .
 .
xml
xmlreader
xmlwriter
xsl
Zend OPcache
zip
zlib 

Step 4. Test PHP

Now, in this last step, we will make a test PHP file in our web server document root to test whether or not the PHP is working. But before that, we need to install the Apache Web server:

sudo apt install apache2 -y

After installation, start and enable the service:

sudo systemctl start apache2 && sudo systemctl enable apache2

If everything is ok, check the status of the service:

sudo systemctl status apache2

You should get output similar to this:

root@host:# sudo systemctl status apache2
● apache2.service - The Apache HTTP Server
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/apache2.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
     Active: active (running) since Thu 2024-03-14 07:33:03 CDT; 8min ago
       Docs: https://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.4/
   Main PID: 92315 (apache2)
      Tasks: 7 (limit: 4624)
     Memory: 16.1M (peak: 16.2M)
        CPU: 170ms
     CGroup: /system.slice/apache2.service

Next, go into your Apache document root:

cd /var/www/html

Create info.php file:

touch info.php

Open the file with your favorite editor and paste the following lines of code:

<?php
phpinfo();
?>

Save the file, close it, and restart the Apache service.

sudo systemctl restart apache2

Now you can access the file in the browser by vising the following URL: http:YourServerIPaddress:/info.php

That’s it. You successfully learned how to install PHP 8.3 on Ubuntu 24.04. Of course, you do not have to do this on your own. Our admins can help you with any aspect of the PHP installation on your server. Feel free to contact us. We are available 24/7.

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