PHP 8.4.24 and 8.5.9 Release Candidates Now Available on Fedora and Enterprise Linux
Remi Collet drops testing builds for the upcoming July 30 stable release across RHEL, Fedora, and compatible forks.
Remi Collet has dropped release candidate packages for PHP 8.4.24RC1 and PHP 8.5.9RC1 across Fedora and the Enterprise Linux family. If you're managing production stacks on RHEL, AlmaLinux, or Rocky, this is your window to test before the final builds land on July 30. The PHP QA team officially announced the RCs back on July 16. Remi’s repositories have long been the pragmatic stopgap for Linux admins who can't wait for distro maintainers to push updates. These candidates are split into base packages and Software Collections, letting you run parallel versions without blowing up your system PHP.
Testing PHP 8.5.9RC1
PHP 8.5.9RC1 was cut by Volker Dusch, Daniel Scherzer, and Pierrick Charron. You can grab it from the remi-modular-test repo for Fedora 42 through 44, or Enterprise Linux 8 and newer. The Software Collection lives in remi-test if you prefer isolation. Source archives are available in .tar.bz2, .tar.gz, and .tar.xz formats. Full SHA256 checksums are provided for every build. Per the official QA cutoff, RC builds lock the feature set. The announcement explicitly states: "RC versions are typically the same as the final release (no changes accepted after RC, except for security fixes)."
Installation and Architecture Notes
Next, PHP 8.4.24RC1 comes from Saki Takamachi, Calvin Buckley, and Eric Mann. Same availability path. Same July 30 target date. I spent a few hours untangling a similar module conflict during a server migration last month, and remi-test kept the sandboxed build from nuking the production environment. It works as advertised. No new RCs for 8.3 either. It entered security-only mode back on December 30, 2025. The 8.4 and 8.5 branches are where the action is right now.
If you need to test without breaking anything, the Software Collection route keeps things sandboxed. Just run yum --enablerepo=remi-test install php85 or php84 depending on which branch you're auditing. Want to actually switch your system stack? DNF modules handle the heavy lifting. dnf module switch-to php:remi-8.5 followed by a repo-enabled update gets you there. Remi also hosts a configuration wizard if your repo setup needs a refresh.
Packages ship for both x86_64 and aarch64. Build environments vary by target, with EL-10 pulling from RHEL 10.2, EL-9 from RHEL 9.8, and EL-8 from RHEL 8.10. Extensions are locked to specific versions too. oci8 leans on Oracle Instant Client 23.26, while intl uses libicu 74.2. PHP 8.5.9RC1 has already hit Fedora rawhide for QA, so expect distro maintainers to start eyeing it shortly. Keep in mind that relying on third-party repos means you're trusting a single maintainer for critical runtime updates, though the convenience of parallel installs usually outweighs the risk for development cycles.
Head to rpms.remirepo.net/wizard/ to grab the exact configuration snippet for your distro. The final July 30 release should just be a matter of waiting on the QA backlog to clear. Keep an eye on the official PHP QA announcements for any last-minute patches.
