Download the PHP package davmixcool/php-sentiment-analyzer without Composer

PHP Sentiment Analyzer

PHP Sentiment Analyzer is a lexicon and rule-based sentiment analysis tool for PHP using VADER (Valence Aware Dictionary and sEntiment Reasoner), matching the reference Python implementation exactly.

Features

• Text
• Emoticon
• Emoji

Requirements

• PHP 8.1 and above

Using PHP below 8.1? Install the 1.x line instead — it is maintained and produces the same scores: composer require davmixcool/php-sentiment-analyzer:^1.3

Contents

• Install
• Modern API
• Simple Usage
• Advanced Usage
• Upgrading
• Relationship to VADER
• License
• Reference

Documentation

• Changelog — release history, including scoring changes
• Migrating from 1.x to 2.0 — breaking changes, and why your scores do not move
• Known divergences — behaviour that differs from reference VADER, documented and pinned by the test suite

Install

Composer

Run the following to include this via Composer

Modern API

Available from 2.0. Returns an immutable result object instead of a bare array.

Labels follow the VADER convention and are exposed as constants, so you can reclassify without hardcoding: compound >= 0.05 is positive, <= -0.05 is negative, and anything between is neutral.

Batch analysis preserves your input keys, so results line up with their source rows:

Custom lexicons return a new analyzer — the original is untouched:

withLexicon() rejects multi-word terms and non-numeric values rather than coercing them. The older updateLexicon() below stays lenient and unchanged.

Simple Usage

Simple Outputs

Advanced Usage

You can now dynamically update the VADER (Valence) lexicon on the fly for words that are not in the dictionary. See the Example below:

Advanced Outputs

Upgrading

3.0.0 changes scores. The scoring engine is now a faithful port of reference Python VADER; roughly 45% of test cases moved. Previous behaviour was wrong most importantly in negation, which was applied at about a third of its intended strength.

If you store sentiment scores or compare them against thresholds, re-score affected text after upgrading. A threshold tuned against 2.x will behave differently — usually catching more genuinely negative text than before.

If you need score stability, stay on the maintained 2.x line:

Three lines are maintained: 3.x (matches reference VADER), 2.x (scores frozen), 1.x (PHP below 8.1). Full detail in MIGRATION.md.

Relationship to VADER

This package matches reference Python vaderSentiment 3.3.2 exactly.

The lexicon files are byte-identical to upstream, and the rule engine is a faithful port — including reference VADER's own quirks, so that scores agree rather than merely being close. Conformance is verified, not asserted:

That scores a 350-case corpus with both implementations and fails if a single case differs. It runs in CI on every push.

Before 3.0.0 this was not true — the port diverged from reference on 47% of cases, most importantly by applying negation at roughly a third of its intended strength. See MIGRATION.md if you are upgrading from 1.x or 2.x, because your scores will change.

License

The package's source code is licensed under the MIT license.

The bundled sentiment and emoji lexicons in src/Lexicons/ are third-party data, redistributed from cjhutto/vaderSentiment under its own MIT license (Copyright (c) 2016 C.J. Hutto). Full attribution and license text are in NOTICE.md.

Reference

Hutto, C.J. & Gilbert, E.E. (2014). VADER: A Parsimonious Rule-based Model for Sentiment Analysis of Social Media Text. Eighth International Conference on Weblogs and Social Media (ICWSM-14). Ann Arbor, MI, June 2014.