Laravel Best Practices: Building Robust and Maintainable Applications

Laravel is one of the most popular PHP frameworks due to its elegance, simplicity, and developer-friendly syntax. But to fully harness Laravel’s power, developers must adhere to certain best practices that ensure their applications are secure, maintainable, and scalable.

In this article, we’ll explore typical best practices for Laravel, drawing examples from a real-world scenario—an admin system handling borrow requests.

1. Use Service Classes for Business Logic

Why? Keeping your controllers thin and offloading business logic to service classes promotes separation of concerns and cleaner code.

public function approveRequestAction($borrowId): JsonResponse
{
    $this->borrowService->approve($borrowId);
    return response()->json(['message' => 'Request approved']);
}

2. Exception Handling

Graceful error handling provides better developer and user experience. Use try-catch blocks and Laravel’s built-in exceptions like ModelNotFoundException.

try {
    $this->borrowService->approve($borrowId);
} catch (ModelNotFoundException $e) {
    return response()->json(['error' => 'Borrow request not found'], 404);
}

Log unexpected exceptions using \Log::error() for future debugging.

3. Follow RESTful API Design Principles

Use HTTP methods meaningfully: GET, POST, PUT/PATCH, DELETE. In the example:

Route::post('/book-requests/{borrowId}/approve', 'approveRequestAction');

Using PUT may be more semantically correct.

4. Route Grouping and Middleware

Organize routes using middleware and prefixes:

Route::middleware(['auth:sanctum', 'role:admin'])
    ->prefix('admin')
    ->controller(BorrowController::class)
    ->group(function () {
        Route::get('/book-requests', 'getPendingRequestsAction');
        Route::post('/book-requests/{borrowId}/approve', 'approveRequestAction');
    });

5. Validation

Use Form Request classes or inline validation to protect your application from invalid input.

$request->validate([
    'borrow_id' => 'required|integer|exists:borrows,id'
]);

6. Use Meaningful HTTP Responses

Return appropriate HTTP status codes and structured JSON responses.

return response()->json([
    'message' => 'Pending borrows retrieved successfully.',
    'data' => $pendingBorrows
], 200);

7. Model Scopes and Eloquent Efficiency

Move repetitive query logic into model scopes:

public function scopePending($query)
{
    return $query->where('status', 'pending');
}

Borrow::pending()->get();

8. Use Constants or Enums for Statuses

Avoid magic strings by defining constants or Enums:

class BorrowStatus {
    const PENDING = 'pending';
    const APPROVED = 'approved';
    const REJECTED = 'rejected';
}

Or use PHP Enums:

enum BorrowStatus: string {
    case PENDING = 'pending';
    case APPROVED = 'approved';
    case REJECTED = 'rejected';
}

9. Log Meaningful Events

Log actions for audits and debugging:

\Log::info("Borrow request {$borrowId} approved by admin");

10. Testing

Write unit and feature tests to ensure your logic works:

public function test_admin_can_approve_borrow_request()
{
    $borrow = Borrow::factory()->create(['status' => 'pending']);
    $response = $this->actingAs($admin)->post("/api/admin/book-requests/{$borrow->id}/approve");
    $response->assertStatus(200);
    $this->assertEquals('approved', $borrow->fresh()->status);
}

11. Use Policies for Authorization

Laravel policies help keep authorization logic clean and reusable:

// In BorrowPolicy.php
public function approve(User $user, Borrow $borrow)
{
    return $user->role === 'admin' && $borrow->status === 'pending';
}

Apply in the controller:

$this->authorize('approve', $borrow);

Register policy in AuthServiceProvider.php:

protected $policies = [
    Borrow::class => BorrowPolicy::class,
];

Conclusion

By following these Laravel best practices—structuring logic through services, applying validation, using policies for authorization, and implementing clean routing and exception handling—you ensure your application is clean, secure, and maintainable. These principles support scalable development and smooth team collaboration.