When comparing Phalcon vs Iris, the Slant community recommends Phalcon for most people. In the question“What are the best backend web frameworks?” Phalcon is ranked 10th while Iris is ranked 56th. The most important reason people chose Phalcon is:
Since the framework is and extension built in C it's extremely fast and efficient. It's actually one of the fastest PHP frameworks, and according to some benchmarks it's the fastest framework out there.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Extremely fast
Since the framework is and extension built in C it's extremely fast and efficient. It's actually one of the fastest PHP frameworks, and according to some benchmarks it's the fastest framework out there.
Pro Open source
Phalcon is open source and is available under the BSD License.
Pro Uses Volt template engine
The Volt template engine, which is embedded into Phalcon itself takes it's inspiration from the Jinja template engine and as such it's nice to look at, with a clear and understandable syntax.
Volt also compiles very fast, like Phalcon itself, so it avoids being a bottleneck for the framework's overall speed.
Pro Very flexible project structure
You can set up the base project as you want. It's very flexible
Pro Clean and light project code
Since the framework code is not in the project directory, the code is light and clean.
Pro Customizable with Zephir
Zephir is a high-level language designed to create PHP extensions easily by PHP programmers with no knowledge in C.
Zephir does this by compiling directly to C and then the C program is in turn compiled to be run as a PHP extension. This, coupled with the fact that Zephir's syntax is very similar to PHP makes it a perfect way for PHP developers to use it for customizing Phalcon.
Pro Loosely coupled components
Some components can be used as standalone packages like models, views, etc..
Pro No need to find and install external libraries
Iris is a "batteries included" web framework, which means that a lot of features already come out of the box. This way you don't have to spend time and find third-party libraries to integrate to the framework for most of the tasks you need to complete.
Pro Efficiency
Efficiency by using a light engine.
Pro Development
Pro API
If you're familiar with expressjs or other modern web frameworks, Iris will make you feel at home.
Pro More than feature complete
Pro More than 250 examples
More than 250 examples for implementing web application.
Pro Low amount of bugs
Most issues are questions, few bug reports and if a bug is found it's quickly patched.
Pro Good for big projects
Iris is a good framework for big projects and the author helps solving problems.
Cons
Con Not for shared hosting
Phalcon needs root access to install the PHP extension which is written in C. Developers who plan on using Phalcon must use VPS or Cloud Hosting with root access available.
Con Require good programming skills
Not so easy to use if you want to gain the best from it.
Con Debugging requires knowledge of C
You need to be a C programmer to debug Zephir or C code. Or if Phalcon is not maintained anymore and you have a problem and don't have much skills in C, you will be hard-pressed to find a C programmer to fix it.
Con Previously experience with net/http
Previously experience with the Go's standard net/http package is necessary for you to move forward with Iris.