The big guys, who know what they're doing use PHP because it makes devops stupid simple. Throw it on the server, its ready. That's always been PHP's killer feature.
Is it? Last time I used PHP (around 5.x-7.x) it was exactly the other way around. For production you needed php-fpm, nginx, opcode cache... it was a nightmare compared with go or even java.
Is it better now?
Does anyone really deploy PHP directly on servers still..? Running it in a Docker container is the simplest thing possible, runs anywhere, and has top-notch performance.
I know what you mean; that has been a problem in the past. In case you have to again, I'd recommend looking into either Roadrunner or Swoole. That makes it possible to have your application run more or less standalone in a single container, hosted by a native application server. This boosts performance incredibly, and exposes a single HTTP port, as it should be.