Pure PHP syntax highlighter — a port of Shiki. Style code blocks with VS Code themes and TextMate grammars, in PHP only.

---

What is shikiphp?

shikiphp is a pure PHP port of Shiki, the syntax highlighter that powers VS Code's own coloring. It tokenizes code with the same TextMate grammars and paints it with the same VS Code themes Shiki uses, producing identical HTML — entirely in PHP.

The problem: server-rendered syntax highlighting in PHP usually means either shelling out to Node, calling a hosted API, or settling for a regex-based highlighter that doesn't understand the language. None of those are great for a Laravel/WordPress/static-site build step.

shikiphp solves this by porting Shiki's real pipeline to PHP:

• TextMate grammar tokenizer (a faithful port of vscode-textmate), incl. embedded languages, injections, and nested repositories
• VS Code theme resolution with scope-selector specificity (vscode-textmate's theme matching)
• A pure-PHP JavaScript regex engine as the grammar regex runtime, fed by an oniguruma-to-es port — the same Oniguruma→RegExp path modern Shiki uses
• Shiki-compatible HTML output: dual light/dark themes via CSS variables, codeToHast, transformers (all hooks), decorations, colorReplacements, structure: inline, and ANSI (lang: 'ansi') highlighting
• the full Shiki bundle — every tm-grammars language (200+) and tm-themes theme (65)
• No PHP extensions beyond json/mbstring, no Node, no native Oniguruma binding
• Validated token-for-token against Shiki.js with an oracle regression harness (scenarios across the full grammar/theme set)

Quick Start

composer require shikiphp/shikiphp

use Shikiphp\Shikiphp;

echo Shikiphp::codeToHtml(<<<'PHP'
<?php
function greet(string $name): string {
    return "Hello, {$name}!";
}
PHP, [
    'lang'  => 'php',
    'theme' => 'github-dark',
]);

Dual themes (light + dark) via CSS variables, like Shiki:

echo Shikiphp::codeToHtml($code, [
    'lang'   => 'ts',
    'themes' => ['light' => 'github-light', 'dark' => 'github-dark'],
]);

Transformers, decorations, and other options (Shiki-compatible):

echo Shikiphp::codeToHtml($code, [
    'lang'        => 'js',
    'theme'       => 'vitesse-dark',
    'transformers' => [new MyLineNumberTransformer()],
    'decorations' => [
        ['start' => ['line' => 0, 'character' => 0], 'end' => ['line' => 0, 'character' => 5],
         'properties' => ['class' => 'highlight']],
    ],
    'colorReplacements' => ['#ffffff' => '#f8f8f2'],
    'structure'   => 'classic', // or 'inline'
]);

// Structured output (a HAST tree you can walk/serialize yourself):
$hast = Shikiphp::highlighter()->codeToHast($code, ['lang' => 'rust', 'theme' => 'nord']);

Highlight ANSI terminal output:

echo Shikiphp::codeToHtml("\e[31merror\e[0m: something broke", [
    'lang'  => 'ansi',
    'theme' => 'github-dark',
]);

CLI:

vendor/bin/shikiphp highlight src/App.php --lang=php --theme=nord
vendor/bin/shikiphp langs
vendor/bin/shikiphp themes

How it works

See ARCHITECTURE.md for the full pipeline. In short:

code → grammar tokenizer → theme resolver → themed tokens → HTML
              │
              └─ OnigScanner → PatternConverter (oniguruma-to-es) → Shikiphp\Regex (JS RegExp engine)

The regex engine is vendored from inline0/phasis, a pure-PHP JavaScript engine. Because Shiki's modern default engine converts Oniguruma patterns to JavaScript RegExp, a JS regex engine is the natural substrate and lets shikiphp match Shiki's output offset-for-offset.

License

MIT © inline0. Bundled TextMate grammars and themes retain their upstream licenses.