The comeback of PHP

As I was posting the most recent edition of the Perl Weekly on DEV I noticed an article Why PHP is Gaining Popularity in 2024: The Unexpected Comeback of a Classic Language.

Skimming it I see it gives several explanation why is PHP gaining popularity, but it did not indicate in any way that it really is gaining anything.

I don't have much to do with PHP but I was wondering about it. So I went to the "best" measurement of programming language popularity, the TIOBE index.

In their October 2024 report I saw that in the last month PHP 0.69% (whatever that means) with a rating of 1.21% and it is now language number 15 compared to a year ago when it was language number 8.

Not exactly a comeback.

Compared to that Python is number 1 with 21.90% rating and an increase of 7.08%. (It was also number 1 a year ago)

Rust is number 13 (was number 20 a year ago) with 1.45% and a +0.53% change.

Perl is number 29 with 0.56%.

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Anyway, back to my work on the Python in Israel and the Rust in Israel sites.