PhpStorm is well suited for any PHP development. It integrates well with Symfony, Laravel, CodeIgniter, Cake & Twig. I have used it very successfully in the past and despite not being my go-to editor, I will still use it when working on PHP heavy frameworks.
I always used and develop API with RapidAPI so also recommend to new people to use and learn about APIs. If we discuss about new user it's so easy to learn and develop API free of cost as well as paid subscription. My experience with RapidAPI is awesome.
PhpStorm is very easy to use, once you get the hang of it. It can take a while to get the hang of it because there's so many options, some of which are buried in the imposing settings panel. It could use some help with multi-cursor, especially multi-file editing but that's a minor gripe.
The JetBrains community is all about helping others succeed, even in the most obscure setups. I have never had a question go unanswered, or I have never been able to come up with empty results in searching for the answer. My questions or concerns are typically address from other users in the community, so timing is pretty quick for a response
Each one of the products I've listed are great in their own right, but non of them provide as complete a solution as PhpStorm in my opinion. Very few products offer all of the features that PhpStorm does and those that do don't have the greatest performance in my experience. Some have a great text editor but lack other critical features while others have a bounty of features, but the text editor is garbage. Before I tried PhpStorm, I stuck to using simple text editors because the features the IDEs offered didn't outweigh performance hit of running such a large, slow program. PhpStorm isn't lightweight by any means but I haven't noticed any of the common performance issues that I experienced with other IDEs.
Firebase is also good tools for user who are working on APIs but the marketplace of Rapid API is non comparative. Like how it's creates APIs and testing phase, supporting of multiple API types etc. These features makes Rapid API very unique from else ones.
Recent AI advancements have saved us time to build by integrating it direct with the IDE allowing build to deployment to happen at a more rapid pace than previously possible
Integrated AI commit message generation saves time and effort from team members shorting time writing documentation allowing more time spent in development
Integrated git development causes less friction across team with version control and merge conflict resolution shortening development work flows