@Edent There is also the html5 dom parser in 8.4, etc.
Nah, I suspect in Ubuntu 26.04 LTS version 8.5 will be available. For those simpler/cheaper webhosting with some oldstable Debian I suspect they use PHP packaged by SURY.
@aslakr yeah, it's a tough trade-off. The new curl stuff in 8.5 looks essential for dealing with all the POSTing it has to do - and the new URl validation is very handy.
Happy for you to make an 8.3 fork if you think it is worth it.