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BrowserSync vs PhpStorm: What are the differences?

Introduction

Here are the key differences between BrowserSync and PhpStorm.

  1. Integration with browser: BrowserSync is a tool that synchronizes changes made to a project across multiple devices in real-time, allowing for quick testing and collaboration. On the other hand, PhpStorm is an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) specifically designed for PHP development, providing features such as code completion, debugging, and version control integration.

  2. Live reload functionality: BrowserSync offers live reload functionality, automatically refreshing the browser when changes are made to files. In contrast, PhpStorm does not include this feature by default, requiring the use of external plugins or tools to achieve the same functionality.

  3. Cross-platform compatibility: BrowserSync is a cross-platform compatible tool, meaning it can be used on various operating systems such as Windows, macOS, and Linux. PhpStorm, on the other hand, has separate versions for different operating systems, with some features varying depending on the platform.

  4. Code analysis and refactoring tools: PhpStorm provides advanced code analysis and refactoring tools to improve code quality and maintainability, features that are not available in BrowserSync. These tools help developers identify and fix issues in their codebase, leading to a more efficient development process.

  5. Project management capabilities: PhpStorm offers extensive project management capabilities, allowing users to work on multiple projects simultaneously, manage dependencies, and implement version control. BrowserSync, while useful for project synchronization, does not include the same level of project management features as PhpStorm.

  6. Price: BrowserSync is a free and open-source tool, whereas PhpStorm is a paid IDE with a subscription-based model. While BrowserSync can be easily accessed and used by anyone, PhpStorm requires a purchase for full access to all its features.

In Summary, BrowserSync and PhpStorm differ in their integration with the browser, live reload functionality, cross-platform compatibility, code analysis tools, project management capabilities, and price.

Advice on BrowserSync and PhpStorm
Johnny Bell

When I switched to Visual Studio Code 12 months ago from PhpStorm I was in love, it was great. However after using VS Code for a year, I see myself switching back and forth between WebStorm and VS Code. The VS Code plugins are great however I notice Prettier, auto importing of components and linking to the definitions often break, and I have to restart VS Code multiple times a week and sometimes a day.

We use Ruby here so I do like that Visual Studio Code highlights that for me out of the box, with WebStorm I'd need to probably also install RubyMine and have 2 IDE's going at the same time.

Should I stick with Visual Studio Code, or switch to something else? #help

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Replies (15)
Erik Ostrom
Recommends
on
RubyMineRubyMine

If you're working with both Ruby and JavaScript, buy RubyMine and shut down the other two. It's much better for Ruby than Visual Studio Code is. It can also do everything WebStorm does, if you install the plugins you need from JetBrains, and they all work together nicely.

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Marc Swikull
Recommends
on
RubyMineRubyMine

If you install RubyMine, you shouldn't need WebStorm, as all the functionality of WebStorm appears to be included in RubyMine. (See here: https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/a/132950).

I've used PhpStorm for several years and have never needed to open (or even download) WebStorm for anything front-end or JavaScript related.

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Russel Werner
Lead Engineer at StackShare · | 6 upvotes · 272.5K views
Recommends
on
WebStormWebStorm
at

I work at the same company as you and I use WebStorm for 99% of my tasks. I also have RubyMine installed and use that when I have to tweak some backend code. I tried using RubyMine for JavaScript but was unhappy with how it felt and I believe that WebStorm is faster because it has less plugins and language extensions running. Summary: Buy and use WebStorm for primary development and keep VS Code around for when you have to touch Ruby.

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Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

I've never had much issue running multiple IDEs and generally pick them based on the languages they best support. For front end work where I mainly use TypeScript, I stick heavily with Visual Studio Code. However, for backend work which we do primarily in Python, PyCharm is my go-to editor. The one thing that I do however is I do remap keyboard shortcuts so I get consistent keyboard ability even when I switch IDEs.

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Danny Battison
Recommends
on
PhpStormPhpStorm

JetBrains all the way - my entire team uses PhpStorm and none of us would even consider switching.

The availability of IDEs for other languages along with consistency in environment and keyboard shortcuts is also a godsend, which is the reason I'd also choose Rider over Visual Studio (but also VS for Mac is trash, but I digress...)

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Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

Visual Studio Code is a text editor. And this is best option in my opinion. For Ruby, I cannot say how VS Code is good. If you wanna choose IDE, RubyMine should fit your needs. Because IDEs are more compatible with major needs. But text editors are just text editor. You can do same things with also text editors. I recommend to try both VS Code and RubyMine. And you will be able to find which fits better for your needs

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Recommends
on
PhpStormPhpStorm

So here is the deal man, bottom line you want to write code. All of these tools are built in a mouse-driven world, they are designed not for engineers, but office monkeys. If you want a real workflow that gives you ultimate performance, customization and speed you need to use a modal editor, I suggest NeoVim. Start using it 20% of the time on single file edits, watch youtube videos about it and teach yourself vim gestures. It will infuriate you for 6 weeks, make you cry for another 2 months. But as you use it more, as long as your usage goes over 40% of the time, in 6 months you will understand why most of the world's too engineers use it. Settling on lesser editors out of laziness is exactly the attitude that results in shitty the engineering. Yeah it's hard. You're smart. You do hard things. Once it isn't hard anymore you will blow yourself away at how much more efficiently you edit files.

Also vim keybindings in a mouse driven editor does not cut it. Managing files, buffers and workflow is half of the value of vim/neovim. It is OK if you have to use an IDE (currently I only use an IDE for java development, so I have little choice)

So use VSCode while you teach yourself vim.

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Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

If I have to choose one I would go with VS Code; it’s become pretty mature and keeps getting better. If those plugins are creating problems for you then just uninstall them, find an alternative, or make a PR to fix. But at the end of the day these are IDE’s and they are meant to save you time. I would go with whatever helps you develop code faster. If restarting VS code slows you down then make a switch, that personally would annoying the crap out of me. Else maybe it’s a quick restart, not the end of the word, hopefully someone will fix at some point.

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Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

If you find something that works and are comfortable with it, stay with it. Changing IDE's and learning their idiosyncrasies takes valuable time away from programming while learning setups and keyboard short cuts. I personally use VS Code for cost and decent multiple language support. I've had issues occasionally with it locking up, but it is under heavy development and continually improving. I have also found it more intuitive for new programmers. ** Having profiles for different languages can reduce the amount of plugins running and issues they can cause.

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Recommends
on
PhpStormPhpStorm

I usually have both running but do the bulk of my language work in the appropriate JetBrains flavor. One thing to watch out for in VS is that under the hood it is running the tools needed for whatever language you are working with. This is where tools like JetBrains shine. While I am sure you can tune the heck out of what you use in VS, the provides context and clarity...

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Kyle Schoonover
Senior Software Engineer at Nordstrom · | 2 upvotes · 234.9K views
Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

I'm personally a Visual Studio Code fan. I've used it for both Go and Java. It really depends on the quality and support of the plugins. Typically VS Code doesn't crash as much as a bad plugin causes an unforeseen error. Make sure you stay up to date and look at alternative plugins.

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Lungu Alexandru-Mihai
Recommends
on
VimVim

Well you can try for a while MacVim because it is already configured with tons of plugins. My favourite text editors are Sublime Text and TextMate which are lightweight and speedy. My feeling is that JetBrains IDEs are making you brainless.

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Recommends
at

Visiual Studio is the best

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Recommends

An integrated development environment software with huge potential in the future is VS Code. So I would personally say you can use VS code.

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Recommends
on
Visual Studio CodeVisual Studio Code

Are you using the prettier-vscode VSCode extension or prettier via prettier-eslint? The prettier-vscode extension recommends you...

Use prettier-eslint instead of prettier. Other settings will only be fallbacks in case they could not be inferred from ESLint rules.

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Pros of BrowserSync
Pros of PhpStorm
    Be the first to leave a pro
    • 287
      Best ide for php
    • 232
      Easy to use
    • 218
      Functionality
    • 166
      Plugins
    • 160
      Code analysis
    • 87
      Integrated version control
    • 76
      Great php ide for mac
    • 73
      All-round php ide
    • 62
      Local history
    • 53
      Themes
    • 18
      Best PHP IDE
    • 11
      Database control
    • 10
      Easy to find anything and everything in your code
    • 9
      Best bebugging
    • 9
      Best inspection variable
    • 7
      Command line integration
    • 7
      Great frameworks integration
    • 7
      PHPUnit integration
    • 7
      Getting Better
    • 7
      UX
    • 6
      Composer integration
    • 6
      Performance
    • 6
      Coolest IDE
    • 5
      Real time code validation
    • 5
      Easy to use and github interaction
    • 5
      Neat does the job and easy
    • 5
      Best ide for advanced php and symfony
    • 4
      Best ide for php
    • 4
      TypeScript support
    • 4
      Code indexing
    • 4
      It has no match. it filled one of the biggest void
    • 4
      Fast and relevant auto-complete
    • 4
      Great refactoring support
    • 4
      Cross platform
    • 3
      Integration with Vagrant and Docker
    • 3
      Debugger for Javascript
    • 3
      Good
    • 3
      Very good
    • 2
      Debugging in the Just-In-Time Mode
    • 2
      Perfect locahost / host sync
    • 2
      Awesome debugging features

    Sign up to add or upvote prosMake informed product decisions

    Cons of BrowserSync
    Cons of PhpStorm
      Be the first to leave a con
      • 14
        Uses a lot of memory
      • 10
        Does not open large files
      • 9
        Slow
      • 8
        Uses Java machine
      • 3
        No way to change syntax highlight for files without ext
      • 2
        No save prompt or asterisk on file change

      Sign up to add or upvote consMake informed product decisions

      - No public GitHub repository available -

      What is BrowserSync?

      BrowserSync makes your tweaking and testing faster by synchronising file changes and interactions across multiple devices. It’s wicked-fast and totally free.

      What is PhpStorm?

      PhpStorm is a PHP IDE which keeps up with latest PHP & web languages trends, integrates a variety of modern tools, and brings even more extensibility with support for major PHP frameworks.

      Need advice about which tool to choose?Ask the StackShare community!

      What companies use BrowserSync?
      What companies use PhpStorm?
      Manage your open source components, licenses, and vulnerabilities
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      Sign up to get full access to all the companiesMake informed product decisions

      What tools integrate with BrowserSync?
      What tools integrate with PhpStorm?

      Sign up to get full access to all the tool integrationsMake informed product decisions

      What are some alternatives to BrowserSync and PhpStorm?
      Webpack
      A bundler for javascript and friends. Packs many modules into a few bundled assets. Code Splitting allows to load parts for the application on demand. Through "loaders" modules can be CommonJs, AMD, ES6 modules, CSS, Images, JSON, Coffeescript, LESS, ... and your custom stuff.
      Browserify
      Browserify lets you require('modules') in the browser by bundling up all of your dependencies.
      LiveReload
      LiveReload monitors changes in the file system. As soon as you save a file, it is preprocessed as needed, and the browser is refreshed.
      Ghostlab
      It is a Mac based app that allows you to test out your responsive design across a variety of devices and browsers
      Git
      Git is a free and open source distributed version control system designed to handle everything from small to very large projects with speed and efficiency.
      See all alternatives