PHPantom

Fast PHP language support powered by PHPantom, a language server with deep type intelligence, generics, and framework awareness. Works in VS Code, Cursor, and other VS Code-based editors, available on the Visual Studio Marketplace and Open VSX.

Getting Started

1. Disable the editor's built-in PHP language features: open Extensions, search for @builtin php, and disable PHP Language Features. Leave PHP Language Basics enabled for syntax highlighting.
2. Disable other PHP language servers (Intelephense, Phpactor, PHP Tools) to avoid duplicate results.
3. Open a PHP project. PHPantom downloads and starts the language server automatically.

Features

Language intelligence. Type-aware completion with automatic imports, signature help, hover, go to definition/implementation, find references, rename, call and type hierarchy, inlay hints, code lens, semantic highlighting, and PSR-12 formatting (with optional Laravel Pint). Understands generics (@template) and PHPStan/Psalm annotations, and is framework-aware, including Laravel Eloquent.

Diagnostics and code actions. Undefined symbols, type errors, argument mismatches, deprecated usage, and unused imports. Refactorings such as extract/inline variable, extract method, generate constructor/getters/setters, implement interface methods, and PHPDoc generation.

Templates and config files. Full support in Blade templates, with the editor's HTML completion and Emmet still active in the markup. In Twig, YAML, and XML files, template names, routes, translation keys, services, and class names complete, navigate, and rename alongside the extensions you already use for those languages (Twig needs an extension that provides the twig language).

Laravel tooling.

• Artisan command runner. Pick a command, fill in its arguments, and run it in the terminal.
• Class generation. Create models, controllers, migrations, and more via artisan make:*, from the command palette or by right-clicking a folder.
• Route list. A filterable panel of your routes with click-through to the controller method.
• Model annotations. Generate @property docblocks on Eloquent models from your database schema.
• Log viewer. Tails storage/logs/*.log with highlighting and clickable stack traces.

These tools run your application only when you invoke them. The language server itself never runs your code; its analysis is purely static.

Settings

The most common settings are below. Search for phpantom in the Settings UI for full descriptions.

Setting	Default	Description
phpantom.rootDir	""	Subdirectory that holds the PHP project (such as api), when it is not the workspace folder itself.
phpantom.phpPath	""	PHP executable for artisan commands. Empty uses php on PATH.
phpantom.inlayHints.parameterNames	true	Parameter name hints at call sites.
phpantom.inlayHints.closureTypes	true	Inferred return type hints on closures and arrow functions.
phpantom.serverPath	""	Path to a custom phpantom_lsp binary.
phpantom.autoDownload	true	Download the server automatically if it is not found.
phpantom.autoUpdate	true	Check for newer server releases periodically.
phpantom.updateCheckIntervalHours	24	How often to check for updates (1-168 hours).
phpantom.releaseTag	"latest"	Server release to download.
phpantom.trace.server	"off"	Trace communication with the language server.

Your files.exclude and files.associations settings are also passed to the language server, so excluded folders stay out of the index and patterns mapped to php are analysed as PHP.

Per-project analysis options live in a .phpantom.toml file. See the language server documentation for details.

Commands

All commands are in the command palette under PHPantom:.

Command	Description
Restart Language Server	Restart the server, applying any downloaded update.
Show Output	Open the PHPantom output channel.
Show Server Version	Show the running server version.
Check for Server Update	Check for a newer server release.
Clear Downloaded Language Server	Remove cached server binaries.
Toggle Inlay Hints	Show or hide all PHPantom inlay hints at once.
Show Logs	Open the log viewer.
Run Artisan Command	Pick and run an artisan command.
New Laravel Class...	Generate a class via artisan make:*.
Show Route List	Open the route list panel.
Generate Model Annotations	Write @property docblocks from the database schema.
Regenerate Model Annotations	Refresh existing annotations without prompting.

Language Server Binary

The extension looks for a server binary in this order: the phpantom.serverPath setting, phpantom_lsp on PATH, a previously downloaded binary, and finally a fresh download from GitHub Releases. Updates are downloaded in the background and take effect the next time the server restarts.

If the download fails or your platform has no prebuilt binary, check the PHPantom: Show Output channel for details, then download or build one yourself (cargo install phpantom_lsp) and set phpantom.serverPath.

Learn More

• PHPantom language server: documentation and .phpantom.toml configuration
• Server changelog: improvements to type intelligence, diagnostics, and completion
• Report an extension issue

License

MIT