Not sure if running an instance of web browser for each little desktop application is THE solution. I personally prefer Python ant TKinter. Yes, it looks ugly, but applications are small and use same runtime. For web developers I might even suggest trying GJS (GTK bindings with JS).
I prefer Blazor, which doesn't require embedding a browser. Running the server portion to serve my pages and json is just like running any other app, so I don't get the "People don't want to run their own server" meme. No one wants to run their own mail server, I get that.
I understand not everybody likes PHP, some prefer python, java, go. PHP is my go to language for tinkering on my personal projects. Also, I don't need to run an instance per each little desktop application. I can run one instance and "host" all them on the same instance.
PHP is still a great environment for toy projects. I write nearly everything web-based in PHP if I have no outside constraints because I can get started with it quickly every single time.
