Effortless Switching Between PHP Versions on macOS

To seamlessly test your application across various PHP versions (e.g., 5.3 to 8.2), you'll need to install the different versions and establish a mechanism for effortlessly switching between them.

Installing PHP Versions:

Utilize Homebrew, a package manager specifically designed for macOS:

brew install php53
brew install php54
...
brew install php82

Switching PHP Versions:

Once you have multiple PHP versions installed, employ Homebrew's link and unlink commands to toggle between them:

# Switch to PHP 7.4
brew unlink php73
brew link php74

This command unlinks PHP 7.3 from the system and links PHP 7.4 instead.

Verifying Version:

To confirm the active PHP version, execute the following command in the Terminal:

which php

This will display the path to the active PHP binary, indicating the version you have successfully switched to.

Note:

For the aforementioned commands to function, ensure you have installed all required PHP versions using Homebrew.