Simon Willison’s Weblog

Which should I learn: Python or PHP?

16th April 2013

My answer to Which should I learn: Python or PHP? on Quora

Python will teach you more about programming than PHP—and you’ll be able to learn PHP easily if you learn Python first.

Posted 16th April 2013 at 4:01 pm · Follow me on Mastodon, Bluesky, Twitter or subscribe to my newsletter

More recent articles

Highlights from my appearance on the Data Renegades podcast with CL Kao and Dori Wilson - 26th November 2025
Claude Opus 4.5, and why evaluating new LLMs is increasingly difficult - 24th November 2025
sqlite-utils 4.0a1 has several (minor) backwards incompatible changes - 24th November 2025

This is Which should I learn: Python or PHP? by Simon Willison, posted on 16th April 2013.

php 181 programming 156 programming-languages 38 python 1206 quora 1005

Next: What are some interesting and unusual tactics to draw people to your booth at a large conference or convention?

Previous: What could be the reason my login with Twitter stopped work in web site?

Monthly briefing

Sponsor me for $10/month and get a curated email digest of the month's most important LLM developments.

Pay me to send you less!

Sponsor & subscribe