---

name: building-laravel-apis description: Builds enterprise Laravel applications with Eloquent, API Resources, Sanctum auth, and queue processing. Use when creating PHP backends, REST APIs, or full-stack Laravel applications.

Laravel

Quick Start

Copy// routes/api.php
Route::get('/health', fn () => ['status' => 'ok']);

Route::middleware('auth:sanctum')->group(function () {
    Route::apiResource('users', UserController::class);
});

Features

Common Patterns

Model with Relationships

Copyclass User extends Authenticatable
{
    use HasApiTokens, HasFactory, SoftDeletes;

    protected $fillable = ['name', 'email', 'password', 'role'];
    protected $hidden = ['password', 'remember_token'];
    protected $casts = ['email_verified_at' => 'datetime', 'password' => 'hashed'];

    public function organizations(): BelongsToMany
    {
        return $this->belongsToMany(Organization::class, 'memberships')
            ->withPivot('role')
            ->withTimestamps();
    }

    public function scopeActive($query)
    {
        return $query->where('is_active', true);
    }

    public function scopeSearch($query, ?string $search)
    {
        return $search
            ? $query->where('name', 'like', "%{$search}%")
                    ->orWhere('email', 'like', "%{$search}%")
            : $query;
    }
}

Controller with Service

Copyclass UserController extends Controller
{
    public function __construct(private UserService $userService) {}

    public function index(Request $request): PaginatedCollection
    {
        $users = $this->userService->list(
            search: $request->input('search'),
            perPage: $request->input('per_page', 20)
        );
        return new PaginatedCollection($users, UserResource::class);
    }

    public function store(CreateUserRequest $request): JsonResponse
    {
        $user = $this->userService->create($request->validated());
        return (new UserResource($user))
            ->response()
            ->setStatusCode(201);
    }

    public function show(User $user): UserResource
    {
        return new UserResource($user->load('organizations'));
    }
}

Form Request Validation

Copyclass CreateUserRequest extends FormRequest
{
    public function authorize(): bool
    {
        return $this->user()->isAdmin();
    }

    public function rules(): array
    {
        return [
            'name' => ['required', 'string', 'min:2', 'max:100'],
            'email' => ['required', 'email', 'unique:users,email'],
            'password' => ['required', 'confirmed', Password::min(8)->mixedCase()->numbers()],
            'role' => ['sometimes', 'in:admin,user,guest'],
        ];
    }
}

Workflows

API Development

1. Create model and migration
2. Create controller with php artisan make:controller --api
3. Add Form Request for validation
4. Create API Resource for responses
5. Write feature tests

Resource Response

Copyclass UserResource extends JsonResource
{
    public function toArray(Request $request): array
    {
        return [
            'id' => $this->id,
            'name' => $this->name,
            'email' => $this->email,
            'organizations' => OrganizationResource::collection($this->whenLoaded('organizations')),
            'created_at' => $this->created_at->toIso8601String(),
        ];
    }
}

Best Practices

Project Structure

Copyapp/
├── Http/
│   ├── Controllers/Api/
│   ├── Requests/
│   ├── Resources/
│   └── Middleware/
├── Models/
├── Services/
├── Policies/
├── Jobs/
└── Events/
routes/
├── api.php
└── web.php
tests/
├── Feature/
└── Unit/

For detailed examples and patterns, see reference files above.