Sites: PHP version and settings

The Environment card on a site’s dashboard controls which version of PHP runs your website, and — on Enhance and cPanel hosting — lets you restart the PHP process pool when the site stops responding. Open My Sites → your site — the card sits at the top left. It is the only PHP screen in the portal; there is no separate PHP page.

What the card controls #

Note: The portal exposes the PHP version and the FPM restart only. Individual PHP directives such as memory_limit or upload_max_filesize are not editable from the portal — set them in a .user.ini or php.ini file in your site if your platform reads one, or ask your provider.

The card also names anything your panel keeps to itself. On Plesk hosting it reads “Backups is managed in Plesk directly.”, which is why the Backups card further down the dashboard is missing there.

Changing the PHP version #

1. Open the site dashboard.
2. Pick the version you want from PHP Version.
3. Select Update.

You are returned to the dashboard with “PHP version update requested.” The change is applied by the control panel and takes a few seconds; reload the site to check it.

Which versions are offered #

Since release 1.0.1.1 the portal asks the server which versions it actually has, rather than offering a fixed list — but only where the panel can answer that question.

Warning: On Enhance the dropdown can therefore offer a version your server does not have. Choosing one fails at the panel, and you get “PHP version change failed:” followed by the panel’s own reason. Nothing is changed when that happens, so the site keeps running the version it was on.

Whatever the source of the list, the version your site is actually running is always shown. If the panel reports something the list does not contain — an older site, or a release newer than this build knows about — that version is added at the top of the dropdown and labelled, for example, PHP 8.1 (current). That is there so the selector cannot silently move your site off a version it is not offering.

Behind the label, each panel spells versions its own way, and the portal translates:

You never type these; they matter only when you are comparing what the portal shows with what you see inside the control panel itself.

Warning: Moving to a newer PHP version can break an application that has not been updated for it — typically WordPress plugins and themes that have not been maintained. Take a backup first if your hosting offers one, change the version, then load several pages of the site including a form and the admin area. If something breaks, switch back to the previous version and the site returns to how it was.

How to pick a version #

• Check the requirements published by your CMS or framework. WordPress, Laravel and most modern applications state a supported range.
• Prefer the newest version your application supports. Newer PHP releases are faster and receive security fixes for longer.
• Change one thing at a time. If you are also updating plugins, do the PHP change separately so you know what caused any breakage.

Restarting PHP-FPM #

PHP-FPM is the pool of PHP processes serving your site. Restarting it clears their state and reloads configuration.

Select Restart beside Restart PHP-FPM Service. You get “FPM restart requested.” There is no confirmation step, and no data is lost — but requests in flight when the pool restarts may fail, so avoid doing it during a busy period.

On cPanel the restart works by re-applying the account’s own PHP version, which is how cPanel rebuilds and reloads that account’s pool. It affects your account only, not other sites on the server.

Warning: On Plesk hosting the Restart button is shown but cannot work. Selecting it returns “FPM restart failed: Restarting PHP-FPM is a server-wide action on Plesk, so it is not offered per site. Switching the PHP version above reloads the handler for this site; contact support if a service restart is needed.” Nothing is restarted and nothing is broken — but if you need a restart on Plesk, switching the PHP version (even to the same one and back) reloads the handler, and otherwise open a ticket.

A restart is worth trying when:

• The site returns 502 or 504 errors, or hangs.
• You have edited .user.ini or php.ini and the change has not taken effect.
• You have installed or enabled a PHP extension through your provider.
• Opcode caching is serving stale code after a deployment.

Troubleshooting #