# symfony/serializer

Handles serializing and deserializing data structures, including object graphs, into array structures or other formats like XML and JSON.

Repository: https://github.com/symfony/serializer
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/serializer
Homepage: https://symfony.com/serializer
Language: PHP
License: MIT
License Family: permissive
Topics: php, symfony, component, symfony-component
Last push: 2026-08-26T09:24:06+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 95/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:39:23.370411+00:00)
- activity 99, release rhythm 87, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 5671, "days_push": 7, "days_rel": 11, "gap_med": 0.0, "n_releases_24m": 81}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 2536, forks 80 (observed 2026-08-28T04:06:59.183271+00:00)

## What it is
The Symfony Serializer component transforms data structures, including object graphs, into array structures or formats like XML and JSON, and back. It uses a flexible system of normalizers and encoders and is commonly used for building APIs and integrating with third-party services.

## Use cases
- serialize PHP objects to JSON for API responses
- deserialize incoming JSON request payloads into PHP objects
- convert object graphs to XML
- map arrays to typed PHP objects
- ignore or rename properties during serialization
- handle circular references when serializing object graphs

## When to choose
- you are building a PHP or Symfony application that needs JSON/XML conversion
- you need configurable object-to-array mapping with normalizers
- you want battle-tested serialization used by Drupal, Shopware, API Platform, and others

## When to avoid
- you are not working in PHP
- you need extremely high-performance binary serialization formats like protobuf or msgpack
- your framework already provides an equivalent serializer you already use

## Facets
- artifact type: library
- maturity: stable
- function: serialization, api-framework
- domain: web-development, backend, apis
- platform: php, cross-platform
- tags: symfony-component, normalizers, encoders, object-mapping, xml, denormalization, php

## Member repositories
- symfony/serializer (main) score 95

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:06:59.183271+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T02:25:13.970255+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/symfony/serializer (fetched 2026-08-28T04:06:59.183271+00:00, sha 730d8bb3ef6f)
  - homepage: https://symfony.com/serializer (fetched 2026-08-29T10:07:25.002833+00:00, sha f2e592cf2451)
  - site_page: https://symfony.com/doc (fetched 2026-08-29T10:07:25.007123+00:00, sha 44889134f4fb)
  - site_page: https://symfony.com/doc/current/components/serializer.html (fetched 2026-08-29T10:07:25.009236+00:00, sha 050ba34b0e98)
  - site_page: https://symfony.com/releases (fetched 2026-08-29T10:07:25.012783+00:00, sha 2fd410222cfe)
  - site_page: https://symfony.com/blog/category/releases (fetched 2026-08-29T10:07:25.014701+00:00, sha b626b5bb1423)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.