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IIS PHP Windows vs Nakama comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

IIS PHP Windows
Ranking in Application Server
9th
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
5.0
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Nakama
Ranking in Application Server
12th
Average Rating
7.4
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2026, in the Application Server category, the mindshare of IIS PHP Windows is 0.6%. The mindshare of Nakama is 0.0%. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Server Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IIS PHP Windows0.6%
Nakama0.0%
Other99.4%
Application Server
 

Featured Reviews

surajku32 - PeerSpot reviewer
SR Solution Engineer at VATSIN TECHNOLOGY PVT LTD
Hosting php apps on windows has delivered fast performance and met strict compliance needs
The main feature is hosting PHP applications in IIS. If we are hosting through XAMPP or another solution, it will be very slow. However, using IIS PHP Windows, the application performance will be very fast. If you want to host your PHP or Laravel-based application in Windows, you can definitely use this extension. Using this extension, you can host your PHP or Laravel application in IIS, and it will have super speed. If you use another solution, it will not give you that speed.
reviewer2849796 - PeerSpot reviewer
software engineer at a consultancy with 11-50 employees
Rapid prototypes have boosted development while long-term growth now needs clearer paths
My main use case for Nakama is the backend and matchmaking, and matchmaking is the most important aspect of Nakama for myself. The other real-time transport and parties and groups are built into that project, which is why I consider Nakama instead of writing my own backend and matchmaking. Matchmaking is by far Nakama's best feature. Matchmaking stands out for me because it is easy to deploy and get running, especially in contrast to Open Match, which requires a lot of work and setup to get things moving. Nakama provides this service in a simple manner, so I do not have to be a cloud engineer or backend engineer to set things up in order to have matchmaking. The real-time capabilities, parties, and groups of Nakama are straightforward and fast for various use cases, particularly if I am developing my own multiplayer game and need a transport layer. Instead of using raw TCP/IP sockets, I can use Nakama's sockets, which simplifies the process, making everything go in and out from the WebSocket.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"If you want to host your PHP or Laravel-based application in Windows, you can definitely use this extension, and using this extension you can host your PHP or Laravel application in IIS and it will have super speed."
"IIS PHP Windows impacts my organization positively because my applications perform very well here when compared with XAMPP."
"IIS PHP Windows has positively impacted my organization by helping to deploy customer websites that have very small budgets, allowing the organization to assist those clients, which builds trust with them."
"In my experience, the best features IIS PHP Windows offers include allowing us to host the PHP application with better performance compared to XAMPP, which we were previously using because XAMPP was giving slow performance."
"In just a few hours, you can get a new game and a server with many features."
"Using Nakama has definitely helped my team save time and resources in measurable ways, such as faster development, particularly if we build multiplayer games according to their provided structure, although creating something with very custom features can be challenging."
"Nakama helps my team prototype and iterate faster, as instead of spending one to three months writing my own backend and matchmaking, I can start right away with Nakama, which represents a huge productivity gain at the start."
 

Cons

"I chose a rating of seven out of ten because IIS PHP Windows is good for small enterprises with manageable aspects, but it has very high resource usage and requires a Windows server license, contributing to the overall cost."
"The scalability of Nakama is not very good if using the open source version, as it lacks distributed presence features."
"The biggest problem we had was that while it has some really nice features, dealing with the tournaments and leaderboards and how they are fixed and static makes the development process a bit of a hassle."
"Customer support for Nakama has not been that good based on my experience when we reached out to them."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
48%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Healthcare Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Construction Company
48%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Outsourcing Company
6%
Wholesaler/Distributor
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with IIS PHP Windows?
IIS PHP Windows can be improved regarding its higher resource usage. Unlike a Linux web server that is very lightweight, the resource usage is higher on Windows. I chose a rating of seven out of te...
What is your primary use case for IIS PHP Windows?
My main use case for IIS PHP Windows is to deploy it for WordPress websites and Laravel custom applications so they can run on IIS using the PHP provider and PHP version. I used IIS PHP Windows for...
What advice do you have for others considering IIS PHP Windows?
Regarding IIS PHP Windows' security, I think its governance and security are solid as long as you configure Windows Active Directory correctly and all Windows authentication so that no other users ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Nakama?
Nakama is free to use, but using Heroic Cloud comes at a different cost, which is currently considered too high internally, as many people feel it does not match the service provided.
What needs improvement with Nakama?
I think Nakama could be improved by making features such as leaderboards easier to customize, and the documentation could be much better, covering more than just the success flow. The community is ...
What is your primary use case for Nakama?
My main use case for Nakama involves a small multiplayer game where players can compete in small groups against each other, with a single winner. Nakama fits into my multiplayer game by providing v...
 

Overview

Find out what your peers are saying about Red Hat, Apache, Oracle and others in Application Server. Updated: June 2026.
902,988 professionals have used our research since 2012.