PHP 7 will be released in mid-October 2015 and includes many new features and performance improvements. Some key changes include scalar type hints, return type declarations, the null coalesce operator, and generator return expressions and delegation. PHP 7 also aims to fix inconsistencies, introduce uniform variable syntax, and make compile times faster while using more memory. It will be backwards incompatible by removing deprecated functionality and changing some syntax rules. Engine exceptions will also allow catching of fatal errors.