As you might know, every year a new PHP-version is released. This year that was PHP 8.3. We try to offer this new version on our hosting platform as soon as a stable release is available.
Together with the adding of a new version, each year support for an older version was dropped. PHP developers no longer supported the older versions and, as a result, we could no longer securely offer these versions. This is why we removed these older PHP-versions for our customers at that point. This has resulted in problems, such as websites that were no longer functioning correctly, but in the trade-off between customer convenience and security, we opted for security.
Recently, the PHP developers decided to extend the period in which security updates were applied. From this year onward, every version gets two years of active support and two years of security support.
We are happy with this decision, and we are glad to follow that schedule. This means we will not phase out a PHP version this year. PHP 8.1 is the oldest supported version, and we will keep offering that until the end of 2025.
Evidently, for the security of your website it remains crucial that the used CMS (Content Management System, such as Wordpress), themes and plugins are up-to-date.
Next to the security involved, in most cases a newer PHP version and an up-to-date CMS will result in better website performance. That is why we still advise to upgrade to the newest PHP version at an early stage. If that causes issues, you can easily switch back or research if there are alternatives to outdated software you might be using.
You can switch between active PHP versions in our Service Centre. More information on how to change the version can be found on our Helpdesk pages.
If you have any questions on this, please contact us through support@greenhost.net.