Laravel continues to evolve, and staying current with best practices is crucial for building maintainable, scalable applications. Having worked extensively with Laravel and being a Laravel Certified Developer, I've gathered insights that can help you write better code.

Architecture Patterns

Modern Laravel applications benefit from clear separation of concerns:

  • Service Classes: Extract business logic from controllers
  • Repository Pattern: Abstract database operations
  • Form Requests: Centralize validation logic
  • Resource Classes: Transform API responses consistently

Performance Optimization

Performance is critical in production environments:

  • Use eager loading to prevent N+1 queries
  • Implement caching strategies (Redis, Memcached)
  • Optimize database queries and indexes
  • Use queue workers for background jobs
  • Leverage Laravel's built-in caching mechanisms

Testing Strategies

Comprehensive testing ensures reliability:

  • Write unit tests for business logic
  • Use feature tests for API endpoints
  • Implement browser tests with Laravel Dusk
  • Maintain high test coverage for critical paths