I built a free, open-source alternative to Spatie Ray — real-time PHP debugging in the browser

Leon — Wed, 18 Feb 2026 13:06:56 +0000

For years I've been juggling var_dump(), Xdebug setups, and paying for tools like Spatie Ray ($49/year) just to see what my PHP app is doing. None of it felt right — either it broke the page, needed heavy IDE integration, or cost money for something that should be free.

So I built DebugPHP.

What it does

DebugPHP streams your debug output to a browser-based dashboard in real-time via Server-Sent Events. No page reloads. No desktop apps. No config hell. Just call Debug::send() and watch it appear.

use DebugPHP\Debug;

Debug::init('your-session-token');

Debug::send('User created!');
Debug::send($user, 'User')->color('blue');
Debug::send($exception, 'Error')->color('red');

Why not just use Xdebug or Ray?

	dd() / var_dump()	Xdebug	Spatie Ray	DebugPHP
Real-time output	❌	❌	✅	✅
No page disruption	❌	✅	✅	✅
Zero config	❌	❌	❌	✅
Browser-based	❌	❌	❌	✅
Free & open source	✅	✅	❌	✅
No dependencies	✅	❌	❌	✅

Current features

Labels & Colors — categorize your entries visually:

Debug::send($query, 'SQL')->color('blue');
Debug::send($error, 'Error')->color('red');

Timers — measure performance inline:

Debug::startTimer('db-query');
$results = $db->query('SELECT * FROM users');
Debug::stopTimer('db-query');
// → Dashboard shows: "db-query: 23.4ms"

Toolbar Metrics — live key-value chips in the topbar, perfect for request-level data:

Debug::metric('Template', 'home.php');
Debug::metric('Memory', memory_get_usage(true) / 1024 / 1024 . 'MB');

Metrics auto-disappear from the toolbar when you remove them from your code — no stale data.

Tables — render arrays as proper tables:

Debug::table([
    ['name' => 'Leon', 'role' => 'Developer'],
    ['name' => 'Sarah', 'role' => 'Designer'],
]);

Pause / Resume / Clear — full control without touching your app.

Self-hostable

Don't want your debug data leaving your machine? The server component is fully open source too:

git clone https://github.com/CallMeLeon167/debugphp-server.git
cd debugphp-server
composer install
# Open /setup/ in the browser — the wizard does the rest

Then just point the client at your own server:

Debug::init('your-token', [
    'host' => 'http://localhost:8080',
]);

Technical details (for those who care)

PHP 8.1+ required, zero runtime dependencies (just ext-curl)
PHPStan Level 10 — the strictest static analysis level, fully passing
SSE-based push architecture — no WebSocket server needed, works on any standard Apache/nginx setup
Data is serialized with PHP's native serialize() + base64 for full type fidelity (objects, exceptions, nested structures all work)
Session tokens tie your app to your dashboard tab — multiple sessions work in parallel

Installation

composer require callmeleon167/debugphp --dev

Requires PHP 8.1+ and ext-curl. That's it.

Status

Currently in pre-release — the core is working and the dashboard is functional, but I'm still polishing things before the public launch on GitHub.

If this sounds useful to you: feel free to open issues or drop feedback here. I'm especially curious whether the self-hosted setup flow works smoothly on different environments.

Built by a PHP dev, for PHP devs. MIT licensed.

Forem: Leon