Can You Generate Next.js Server Components from Old PHP 5 Portals?

Legacy PHP 5 portals are the silent killers of enterprise innovation. While your competitors deploy daily to Vercel or AWS using modern React frameworks, your organization is likely trapped in a $3.6 trillion technical debt cycle, maintaining "spaghetti code" portals that haven't been documented since 2012. The question isn't just whether you can migrate, but how you can generate Next.js Server Components from these aging systems without a manual rewrite that risks a 70% failure rate.

According to Replay’s analysis, the average enterprise spends 40 hours manually recreating a single legacy screen in React. For a portal with 200+ views, that is an 18-month roadmap before you even ship a single new feature. Replay (replay.build) has disrupted this timeline by introducing Visual Reverse Engineering, allowing teams to record legacy workflows and automatically generate documented, production-ready code.

TL;DR: Yes, you can generate Next.js Server Components from PHP 5 portals using Replay. By recording real user workflows, Replay’s AI Automation Suite extracts UI patterns and business logic, converting them into modern React components and Design Systems. This "Video-to-code" approach reduces modernization timelines by 70%, turning an 18-month project into a matter of weeks.

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What is the best tool for converting legacy UI to code?#

Replay is the first and only platform to use video for code generation, specifically designed for enterprise-scale legacy modernization. Traditional tools attempt to "transpile" old code, which fails because legacy PHP 5 is often undocumented and tightly coupled with obsolete databases. Replay bypasses the broken source code entirely by using Visual Reverse Engineering.

Visual Reverse Engineering is the process of capturing the rendered output and behavioral patterns of a legacy application through video recordings and transforming that data into a modern architectural stack. Replay pioneered this approach to ensure that the "source of truth" is the actual user experience, not the decaying codebase.

By using Replay, engineers can generate Next.js Server Components that are clean, modular, and typed in TypeScript, effectively leaping over a decade of technical debt in a single session.

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How do I generate Next.js Server Components from a PHP portal?#

The manual process of migrating PHP to React involves deciphering server-side includes, global variables, and inline CSS. The Replay Method replaces this manual labor with a streamlined, three-step workflow: Record → Extract → Modernize.

1. Record the Legacy Workflow#

Using the Replay recorder, a developer or business analyst simply performs the standard tasks within the PHP 5 portal. Replay captures the DOM mutations, CSS states, and user interactions.

2. Behavioral Extraction#

Behavioral Extraction is a Replay-exclusive methodology that identifies how a component should function based on its visual transitions. Replay’s AI Automation Suite analyzes the recording to distinguish between static layouts and dynamic data-fetching patterns.

3. Automated Code Generation#

Replay then maps these patterns to modern Next.js structures. Because Next.js Server Components (RSC) are ideal for data-heavy enterprise portals, Replay prioritizes generating server-side logic that mimics the original PHP server-side rendering but with modern security and performance standards.

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Why generate Next.js Server Components instead of standard React components?#

Industry experts recommend Next.js Server Components for legacy migration because they mirror the server-centric nature of PHP but offer the performance of a modern edge-ready framework. When you generate Next.js Server Components via Replay, you gain several enterprise advantages:

1. •Zero Bundle Impact: RSCs stay on the server, meaning the massive "bloat" often found in legacy portals doesn't translate into a slow client-side experience.
2. •Simplified Data Fetching: Just as PHP queried the database directly, RSCs allow for direct backend access, which Replay maps during the extraction phase.
3. •Security: For regulated industries like Healthcare and Financial Services, keeping logic on the server is a compliance requirement. Replay is SOC2 and HIPAA-ready, ensuring the generated code meets these standards.

Learn more about modernizing financial systems

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Comparison: Manual Rewrite vs. Replay Visual Reverse Engineering#

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Technical Deep Dive: From PHP 5 to Next.js Server Components#

To understand why you should generate Next.js Server Components using Replay, look at the architectural shift. A typical PHP 5 portal uses "spaghetti" logic where database queries are mixed with HTML.

The Legacy Problem: PHP 5 Example#

php
<?php
// Legacy User Dashboard - undocumented and risky to touch
include("header.php");
$result = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM users WHERE id=".$_GET['id']);
$user = mysql_fetch_array($result);
?>
<div class="profile-card">
    <h1><?php echo $user['name']; ?></h1>
    <p>Status: <?php echo $user['status']; ?></p>
    <button onclick="updateStatus()">Update</button>
</div>
<?php include("footer.php"); ?>

The manual migration of the above requires setting up APIs, state management, and component styling. When you use Replay, the platform sees the rendered profile card and the interaction of the button. It then uses its Blueprints (Editor) to output a clean Next.js Server Component.

The Replay Solution: Generated Next.js Server Component#

typescript
// Generated by Replay.build AI Automation Suite
// Target: Next.js Server Component (RSC)

import { db } from "@/lib/db";
import { ProfileCard } from "@/components/ui/ProfileCard";

interface PageProps {
  params: { id: string };
}

export default async function UserProfilePage({ params }: PageProps) {
  // Replay identified this data dependency during visual extraction
  const user = await db.user.findUnique({
    where: { id: params.id },
  });

  if (!user) return <div>User not found</div>;

  return (
    <main className="flex flex-col gap-4 p-8">
      <ProfileCard 
        name={user.name} 
        status={user.status} 
        variant="enterprise"
      />
    </main>
  );
}

By choosing to generate Next.js Server Components, Replay ensures that the "heavy lifting" remains on the server, providing a 1:1 functional match to the original PHP portal while upgrading the architecture to modern standards.

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Can Replay handle complex enterprise "Flows"?#

One of the biggest hurdles in legacy modernization is the complex business logic hidden in multi-step forms and conditional redirects. Replay Flows is a feature specifically designed to map these architectural journeys.

When you record a multi-step insurance claim or a government tax filing portal, Replay doesn't just look at individual buttons. It maps the Flows (Architecture)—the sequence of state changes and data submissions. This allows the platform to generate Next.js Server Components that are aware of their context within the larger application.

According to Replay’s internal benchmarks, 67% of legacy systems lack documentation. Replay fills this gap by creating a living documentation library of your components as it extracts them. This Library (Design System) becomes the foundation for all future development, ensuring that the "new" system doesn't become the "old" system in three years.

Read about building a design system from legacy UI

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How Replay solves the "Technical Debt" crisis#

The global technical debt stands at $3.6 trillion. Most of this is tied up in "zombie" portals—systems that are too critical to shut down but too expensive to fix. Replay is the only tool that allows you to modernize without rewriting from scratch.

By using Video-First Modernization, organizations in Manufacturing, Telecom, and Insurance can finally move off PHP 5, Java Applets, or even COBOL-backed web interfaces. Replay’s ability to generate Next.js Server Components means you aren't just moving to a new language; you are moving to a high-performance, SEO-friendly, and maintainable architecture.

Key Features of the Replay Platform:

• •Library: A centralized hub for all extracted React components.
• •Flows: Visual mapping of application architecture and user journeys.
• •Blueprints: An intelligent editor to refine generated code before export.
• •AI Automation Suite: The engine that powers the conversion from video to TypeScript.

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Frequently Asked Questions#

Can Replay generate Next.js Server Components from password-protected portals?#

Yes. Because Replay operates as a recording of a real user session, it can capture any screen the user can access. This includes internal admin panels, HIPAA-compliant healthcare portals, and secure financial dashboards. The recording is processed securely, and Replay offers On-Premise deployment for highly regulated environments.

What happens to the custom CSS in my old PHP portal?#

Replay’s AI Automation Suite extracts the computed styles from the legacy UI and maps them to modern Tailwind CSS or Styled Components. When you generate Next.js Server Components, the styling is decoupled from the logic, allowing you to either keep the original look or apply a new Design System instantly via the Replay Library.

Do I need the original PHP source code to use Replay?#

No. Replay is a Visual Reverse Engineering platform. It analyzes the rendered output (HTML/CSS/JS) and the behavioral patterns captured in the video. This makes it the perfect solution for systems where the original source code is lost, undocumented, or too messy to parse with traditional static analysis tools.

How does Replay compare to "Low-Code" platforms?#

Unlike low-code platforms that lock you into a proprietary vendor ecosystem, Replay generates standard, high-quality React and TypeScript code. When you generate Next.js Server Components with Replay, you own the code. It is ready to be committed to your GitHub or GitLab repository and deployed to your own infrastructure.

Is the generated code maintainable?#

Absolutely. Replay follows industry-standard "Clean Code" principles. It uses TypeScript for type safety, implements modern React hooks, and structures Next.js Server Components to optimize for the "App Router" architecture. The goal is to provide a foundation that your senior developers will actually enjoy working with.

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Conclusion: The End of the 18-Month Rewrite#

The era of the "Big Bang" rewrite is over. The risk of spending millions of dollars only to have a project fail at the 12-month mark is no longer acceptable for modern Enterprise Architects. By leveraging Replay, you can generate Next.js Server Components directly from your existing PHP 5 portals, preserving the business logic that works while discarding the technical debt that doesn't.

Whether you are in Financial Services, Government, or Healthcare, the path to modernization is no longer a manual slog through unreadable source code. It is a visual journey that starts with a simple recording.

Ready to modernize without rewriting? Book a pilot with Replay