Don’t know how to install PHP 8 on Ubuntu 20.04? We can help you.

A powerful scripting language for web development, we can execute PHP on a Linux, Windows, macOS, and Unix system with PHP runtime installed.

As part of our Server Management Services, we assist our customers with several PHP queries.

Today, let us see how to install PHP 8.0 on the Ubuntu Linux system.

Install PHP 8 on Ubuntu 20.04/Ubuntu 18.04

Moving ahead, let us see the steps our Support Techs employ to perform the installation.

Step 1: System Update

First and foremost, we need to update all system packages to the latest. For that, we run the commands below.

$ sudo apt update
$ sudo apt -y upgrade

Our Support Techs recommend a reboot after an upgrade.

$ sudo systemctl reboot

Step 2: Add Ondrej Sury PPA repository

The latest PHP packages are available in the Ondrej Sury PPA repository. We run the commands below to add this repository to the Ubuntu system.

$ sudo apt update
$ sudo apt install lsb-release ca-certificates apt-transport-https software-properties-common -y
$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ondrej/php

Then hit the enter key when it prompts us to add the repository.

Here, from the update output, we can see the repositories added:

…
Get:5 http://ppa.launchpad.net/ondrej/php/ubuntu focal InRelease [23.9 kB]
Get:10 http://ppa.launchpad.net/ondrej/php/ubuntu focal/main amd64 Packages [74.8 kB]
Get:11 http://ppa.launchpad.net/ondrej/php/ubuntu focal/main i386 Packages [20.2 kB]
Get:12 http://ppa.launchpad.net/ondrej/php/ubuntu focal/main Translation-en [28.2 kB]
Fetched 147 kB in 1s (158 kB/s)
Reading package lists… Done

Step 3: Install PHP 8 on Ubuntu 20.04|18.04

Moving ahead, we update the APT index just to ensure it is ready for package installation:

$ sudo apt update

Then we install PHP 8.0 on Ubuntu 20.04|18.04 Linux machine:

$ sudo apt install php8.0

Eventually, hit the ‘y‘ key to start the installation.

Then we confirm the default PHP version on the server.

$ php -v
PHP 8.0.0RC3 (cli) (built: Oct 31 2020 17:06:41) ( NTS )
Copyright (c) The PHP Group
Zend Engine v4.0.0-dev, Copyright (c) Zend Technologies
with Zend OPcache v8.0.0RC3, Copyright (c), by Zend Technologies

Step 4: Install PHP 8 Extensions on Ubuntu 20.04|18.04

To install PHP 8 extensions on Ubuntu 20.04|18.04, we use the command syntax:

$ sudo apt install php8.0-<extension>

For example,

$ sudo apt install php8.0-cli php8.0-common php8.0-imap php8.0-redis php8.0-snmp php8.0-xml

We can use the same format to install other extensions.

Common error

In addition, an error we may come across is:

Error: Unable to locate package

This error occurs when we try to install a dependency.

In such a case, we have to install the most recent version of the required dependency from Debian packages.

[Failed to finish the installation? We’d be of assistance]

Conclusion

In short, we saw steps our Support Techs employ in order to install PHP 8 on Ubuntu.