How do PHP developers balance the use of comments for code readability with potential impact on processing speed?

PHP developers can balance the use of comments for code readability with potential impact on processing speed by using comments strategically for complex or important sections of code, while avoiding excessive comments that could slow down processing. They can also consider using PHP's built-in documentation features like PHPDoc comments for documenting functions and classes, which can be extracted into separate documentation files. Additionally, developers can use tools like opcache to improve the performance of PHP scripts by caching the compiled code.

<?php

// This is a comment explaining the purpose of the following code
$variable = 10; // This comment explains the value assigned to the variable

/**
 * This is a PHPDoc comment for a function
 * @param int $num1
 * @param int $num2
 * @return int
 */
function addNumbers($num1, $num2) {
    return $num1 + $num2;
}

// Use opcache to improve PHP script performance
opcache_reset();

?>