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The php debugger you already run just became a coverage tool. xdebug 3.6, out september 8, adds…

Yethikrishna ROriginal on Threads

the php debugger you already run just became a coverage tool. xdebug 3.6, out september 8, adds path and branch information to its coverage output and supports php 8.6.

one extension now does stack traces and coverage reports.

Context

Xdebug's announcement of September 8, 2026 is for Xdebug 3.6.0alpha1. It says this is a preview release that supports PHP 8.6 beta releases, and that it contains rewritten code coverage support, for better results, and support for FrankenPHP workers. It says Xdebug 3.6 no longer supports PHP 8.0 and PHP 8.1.

How it compares

This is an alpha preview and not a stable 3.6, and the PHP 8.6 support is for betas. Xdebug already collected path and branch coverage in earlier versions, per bug entries in its updates listing, and the passages read describe rewritten coverage and do not say path and branch information is newly added, so that claim is unverified. It is not newly a coverage tool. One extension now does stack traces and coverage reports is the author's line.

Watch next

  • Xdebug 3.6 beta or stable, and the exact coverage change entries on the updates page.

Sources

  1. Xdebug announcement: 3.6.0alpha1 (September 8, 2026)xdebug.org
  2. Xdebug updatesxdebug.org

Provenance

The note above is reproduced unedited from the original post, first published on Threads on 22 September 2026 at 06:37 IST. Sources are the papers and datasets the note draws on.

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