Getting Started with Laravel 12: What's New and Exciting

Laravel 12 brings a wave of new features including improved performance, better developer experience, and powerful new tools. Let's explore what's changed.

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SenpaiDev

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| | 2 min read | 51 |
Original guide Updated Jun 17, 2026 Editorial standards

Laravel 12 has landed with some incredible improvements that every developer should know about. In this article, we'll walk through the most significant changes and how to take advantage of them in your projects.

Performance Improvements

The framework now includes optimized query building, lazy collection improvements, and a revamped routing engine that can handle significantly more requests per second.

New Artisan Commands

Several new Artisan commands make common tasks faster. The new make:action command creates action classes following the single responsibility principle.

The improved optimize command now handles config, route, and view caching in a single step, simplifying your deployment process.

Better Testing Tools

Testing got a major upgrade with built-in snapshot testing, improved HTTP testing helpers, and a new assertDatabaseHas syntax that's more expressive.

These changes make Laravel 12 the most developer-friendly version yet. Start migrating your projects today to take advantage of these improvements.

Laravel field notes

How To Apply This In A Real Laravel App

Use the guide as a starting point, then validate the idea against the shape of your application. In Laravel projects, the safest pattern is to make the first version small, measurable, and easy to remove if the tradeoff is wrong.

Implementation approach

Start with one route, one controller or action, and one test that proves the expected behavior. Once the path is stable, extract shared code into a service class or action only if a second caller needs it.

For production work, keep config in environment variables, cache expensive reads, and add clear failure states. A feature that works locally but fails silently in a queue, scheduler, or cached config environment is not ready for users.

Review Checklist

  • Add a feature or regression test before changing shared behavior.
  • Run the route through production-like cache settings with config and route caching enabled.
  • Check authorization, validation, and error responses before exposing the feature publicly.
  • Document any non-obvious tradeoff in the code or guide notes so future edits stay honest.
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SenpaiDev

Publisher at SenpaiDev, maintaining practical guides and browser tools for everyday digital work.

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