Yii is a high-performance, component-based PHP framework for rapidly developing modern web applications. Created by Qiang Xue in 2008, Yii pioneered the use of lazy loading and ActiveRecord patterns in PHP, and Yii 3 (rolling release) is a complete rewrite as a set of decoupled packages.
The framework is known for its speed — Yii consistently appears at the top of PHP benchmark roundups — and for Gii, the code generator that scaffolds models, CRUD interfaces, and modules from database schemas.
High-performance PHP framework. Pragmatic, fast, suited for large-scale Web 2.0 applications.
✨ Features
Aggressive lazy loading and caching. Consistently fastest in PHP framework benchmarks.
Web-based generator scaffolds models, controllers, CRUDs, and modules from database schemas.
Form widgets with client + server validation that share a single rule definition.
Hierarchical role-based access control built in. Permissions, roles, rules, hierarchies via API.
Yii 3 ships as decoupled Composer packages. Pull only what you need; no monolith required.
