PHP 8.1 Is Unsupported, and PHP 8.2 Ends on December 31

PHP 8.1 has had no security fixes since December 31, 2025, and PHP2Shell showed what that means. For 8.1 and older the PHP project released no update, only minimal patches to build from source, so owners have to ask their host for a backport or move to a supported version.

The next date is close, because the 8.2.35 announcement says 8.2 stops receiving security fixes on December 31, 2026. According to php.net, 8.3 is supported until the end of 2027, 8.4 until the end of 2028 and 8.5 until the end of 2029. WordPress 7.x still runs on PHP 7.4, so a site can stay on an unpatched version for years, which is why PHP should be kept on a current, supported version and upgraded before the old one reaches its end date.