---
title: "Zend Framework: Classification in the PHP Ecosystem"
lang: en
type: knowledge
canonical: https://www.arocom.de/en/knowledge/drupal/zend
alternate: https://www.arocom.de/wissen/drupal/zend
author: "Axel Roth"
last_updated: 2026-07-29
---

# Zend Framework: Classification in the PHP Ecosystem

Zend Framework, continued as the Laminas Project since 2019, was one
of the first enterprise PHP frameworks. In today's PHP ecosystem,
Symfony has taken over the leading role and forms the foundation of
Drupal. arocom has been working with Drupal on a Symfony basis since
2012 and classifies Zend as historically significant but no longer
relevant for new projects.

## Zend Framework: Classification in the PHP Ecosystem

Zend Framework was released in 2006 by Zend Technologies,
the company behind the PHP engine. It was one of the first
frameworks to bring enterprise patterns like MVC, service locator,
and dependency injection to the PHP world.

## From Zend to Laminas

In 2019, Zend Framework was transferred to the Laminas Project,
a community-driven open-source project under the umbrella
of the Linux Foundation. The reason: Zend Technologies (now
part of Perforce) wanted to hand off maintenance.

Laminas continues to be developed but has a smaller community
and less momentum compared to Symfony. For existing
Zend projects, Laminas provides a migration path.

## Zend vs. Symfony: Why Symfony Won

**Community size.** Symfony has a larger and more active
community. More contributors mean faster bugfixes,
better documentation, and more available bundles.

**Adoption.** Drupal, Laravel (partially), and numerous
enterprise applications use Symfony. Zend/Laminas has
fewer prominent adopters.

**Component architecture.** Symfony was earlier with the
approach of making individual components independently usable.
This enabled adoption in projects like Drupal.

**Developer experience.** Symfony's documentation, CLI tools,
and debugging tools set the standard in the PHP ecosystem.

## What This Means for Drupal Projects

Drupal deliberately chose Symfony over Zend in 2015. This
decision was correct: Symfony offers a larger community,
better support, and more active development.

For companies still running Zend-based applications,
the question of migration arises. Drupal on a Symfony
basis is a future-proof platform that meets modern
PHP standards.

## Modernize Your PHP Platform?

The [Future Check](https://www.arocom.de/en/future-check) analyzes your existing
PHP infrastructure and recommends the modernization path. From
2,500 EUR plus VAT, creditable toward the follow-up project.

**From arocom projects:**

- Aqua Römer sells mineral water regionally and needs a site that stays visible in local search. We set up Drupal 10 with schema markup, clean redirects, and a newsletter loop, the brand stays in the local top results without requiring constant marketing intervention.
- We've migrated [Aventerra](https://www.arocom.de/en/references/aventerra) step by step from Drupal 6 to Drupal 11 since 2012, 5 major versions across more than a decade, without the platform ever being offline for more than a day.

### Is Zend Framework dead?

Zend Framework was renamed to Laminas and continues to be maintained. However, the community is significantly smaller than Symfony's. For new projects, Symfony or a system based on it like Drupal is recommended.

### Can Zend code be reused in Drupal?

Not directly, since Drupal is based on Symfony. PHP libraries that are framework-independent can be integrated into Drupal via Composer. A migration requires reimplementation of the framework-specific parts.

### Why did Drupal choose Symfony instead of Zend?

At the time of the decision, Symfony had the larger community, better component architecture, and clearer release cycle. The Drupal community made this decision after thorough evaluation.

## Read more

- [Symfony and Drupal](https://www.arocom.de/en/knowledge/drupal/symfony): Why Drupal is based on Symfony
- [PHP in the Drupal context](https://www.arocom.de/en/knowledge/development/php): The programming language behind Drupal
- [Why Drupal?](https://www.arocom.de/en/why-drupal): The detailed analysis