The server-side language Laravel and CodeIgniter are both built on — mature, fast for typical web workloads, and running a large share of the web's backend infrastructure.
Why I use it
Deep hosting compatibility — runs on virtually any shared or managed host without special setup
Modern PHP (8.x) is fast, typed, and nothing like the loosely-typed PHP of a decade ago
Huge library ecosystem via Composer for anything from PDF generation to payment gateways
Where it fits
Any Laravel or CodeIgniter project (PHP is the language underneath both)
Maintaining and modernizing an existing PHP codebase without a full rewrite
Current version
PHP 8.3/8.4 era — modern PHP has typed properties, enums, and real performance gains over legacy PHP 5/7 code.