PHP is the most popular server-side scripting language, powering millions of websites including most WooCommerce stores.
If you arrived at this page from the notice in your WooCommerce store, your store is running an outdated and unmaintained version of PHP. Not only is your website’s performance (a lot) lower than it should be, you may find that things do not work as you expect and be open to security vulnerabilities!
What is PHP?
PHP is a scripting language which most likely powers your WooCommerce webshop. PHP, like all software, gets updated over time to patch security issues and improve its features. And like other software, it’s important to keep your PHP version up to date.
Updating your PHP version
Contact your host
In most cases you cannot update the PHP version yourself and need to contact your host about this. The upgrade process is an easy process and should be something your host can do for you without impacting your website or charging you a fee. Here’s a letter you can send to your hosting company:
Dear host,
I’m running a WooCommerce webshop on one of your servers and WooCommerce has recommended using at least PHP 7.0. WordPress, the content management system that WooCommerce uses, has listed PHP 7.4 as the recommended version on n their requirements page: https://wordpress.org/about/requirements/
Can you please let me know if my hosting supports PHP 7.0 or higher and how I can upgrade?
Looking forward to your reply.
VPS Server
If you have a VPS server, see How to upgrade from PHP 5.
My host doesn’t support PHP 7.0
If your host doesn’t support PHP 7.0 or higher, we recommend you find a host that does. We have a list of WordPress hosting solutions we recommend and all support PHP 7.0 or higher. If you contact another host, be sure to ask them which PHP version your website will run on before purchasing.
More information
PHP has a list of unsupported version including dates on their website. If you develop WordPress plugins yourself you might want to check out the PHP library called WPupdatePHP.