Hiring a Laravel Developer: 12 Things to Check Before You Sign

When a team is ready to hire laravel developer help, the proposals in the inbox are not comparable yet. I am Zubair Akhtar, a senior full-stack engineer in Lahore, and this is the pass I want a buyer to run before they sign. It applies when the developer is me. It is a code review, a way to read the rate, and a short list of red flags.

Laravel development services, in the sense I publish them, means an application, an API, a CRM, or a business platform, with the same person still on the pull requests after the kickoff call. The page for that work is Laravel development services. A store, a checkout, or a payment integration is a different brief, and I keep it on ecommerce development.

Figure 1. Five-step pass before you hire a Laravel developer, from a code sample through review, rate, and red flags.

Before you hire laravel developer help

I run these twelve checks in this order. A later check does not rescue an earlier failure. If the sample is not theirs, I do not spend the call negotiating a rate.

1. The commits have their name on them.
2. You review one pull request, not a slide.
3. Eloquent loads the relations the page prints.
4. Authorization is a policy or a gate.
5. Validation is a form request, and the failure shape matches the UI.
6. The queue is allowed to fail, and production is not the sync driver.
7. Secrets stay out of git, and SQL is not built by concatenating input.
8. One feature test hits the database and asserts the HTTP response.
9. They can name how they deploy, and how they roll back.
10. The rate is a scope: hours, revisions, review, and the week after release.
11. Dedicated means the same person, not a bench that rotates.
12. The red flags in the sample are enough. The call does not erase them.

Figure 2. Twelve checks before hiring a Laravel developer, split into the repository, the production habits, and the commercial terms.

Read the repository

1. The commits have their name on them

Ask for a repository they can open, with history. I look at git log and the author email, not at a screenshot of a dashboard theme. A fork of a tutorial with no commits after the fork is a bookmark. A ZIP with vendor/ committed and no .git is a snapshot you cannot audit.

If they cannot show the history because the work belongs to a previous client, a private throwaway branch that they wrote for you is enough. Ten commits they authored tell you more than a portfolio grid.

2. One pull request

I ask for a single change that a reviewer could merge: a migration, a model, a policy, a form request, and a test. A folder of finished controllers hides the decisions. A pull request shows them.

This is the diff I want to be able to read in one sitting. If the change touches twenty unrelated areas, the author does not know how to slice work, and your backlog will arrive the same way.

3. Eloquent that does not hide an N+1

On a list page I want the relations eager-loaded in the query that builds the page, not loaded one row at a time in the template.

$projects = Project::query()
    ->with(['owner', 'tasks'])
    ->latest()
    ->paginate(25);

The failure mode is short enough to spot in a Blade loop: Project::all(), then $project->owner->name inside the loop. That is one query per row. I also look for $fillable or $guarded on the model, and for $hidden on anything that gets returned as JSON. Mass assignment and a leaked password hash are the two mistakes I still see in samples that otherwise look tidy.

4. Authorization is a policy

Hiding a button is not authorization. The check belongs on the server, in a policy or a gate, and the controller has to call it.

public function update(User $user, Project $project): bool
{
    return $project->user_id === $user->id;
}

public function update(UpdateProjectRequest $request, Project $project): RedirectResponse
{
    $this->authorize('update', $project);

    $project->update($request->validated());

    return redirect()->route('projects.show', $project);
}

I ask what happens when someone sends the request anyway, with curl, while logged in as a different user. The answer I want is 403, and a row that did not change.

5. Validation is a form request

Rules live in UpdateProjectRequest, not in a 40-line controller method. The JSON or redirect payload on failure has to be the shape the frontend already handles. A sample that validates name as required and then lets a second endpoint write the same column with no rules is two different applications.

6. The queue is allowed to fail

Mail, webhooks, invoices, and imports belong on a queue. I read the job class. handle() should be safe to run twice, because a worker will retry. failed() should tell a person. A comment that says "log it later" is an unfinished job.

The production queue connection should be one they can name: database, redis, or a managed queue. sync runs the job inside the web request. It is fine for a local test. It is not a production setup, and a timeout in the request will take the user's page down with the job.

7. Secrets, uploads, and SQL

Three searches are enough:

• DB::select, DB::statement, and whereRaw with a variable interpolated into the string. Bindings belong in the second argument.
• A real .env offered in chat, or committed next to .env.example. The example file lists keys. It does not list passwords.
• An upload that checks the extension and not the MIME type, or that stores the file on the public disk with the original filename.

CSRF stays on for the state-changing web routes. An API that accepts a session cookie without a token story needs an explanation, not a shrug.

8. One feature test

I am not asking for a coverage percentage. I am asking for one test that boots the framework, writes a row, acts as a user, and asserts the HTTP result.

public function test_a_member_cannot_update_another_members_project(): void
{
    $owner = User::factory()->create();
    $other = User::factory()->create();
    $project = Project::factory()->for($owner)->create();

    $this->actingAs($other)
        ->patch(route('projects.update', $project), [
            'name' => 'Taken over',
        ])
        ->assertForbidden();

    $this->assertSame($owner->id, $project->fresh()->user_id);
}

Project::factory()->for($owner) assumes the factory's user() relationship. If they cannot point at a test like this, the sample has not been exercised by anything except a browser tab on their machine.

9. Deploy and rollback

Ask where the app runs, how a migration is applied, and what they did the last time a release was wrong. I want a concrete answer: the command, the host, and the path back. php artisan migrate --force on a production deploy, a config cache that is rebuilt after env changes, and a previous release they can put back.

"We use GitHub" is not a deploy. A Laravel developer who has shipped one application can tell you what happened to the database when the code went backwards. Some migrations cannot be reversed. They should say so before you sign, not during the incident.

How to read the rate

10. A rate is a scope

I am not printing a regional rate table. The public pages I can open mix three different things: a marketplace's own price for developers it places, an old national average for software developers in general, and posts from agencies that sell Laravel work. Those figures are not a quote for your backlog, and I will not turn them into a table with my name on it.

Compare the number you were given against the scope, line by line:

• Who is invoicing, the person who will commit, or a company that can swap that person.
• Whether the figure is hourly with a weekly cap, or fixed. A fixed price needs a written list of screens and edge cases. An hourly price needs the cap and what happens when a ticket crosses it.
• What a week includes: building, code review, the standup, staging, and bugfixes after release. Content entry and payment-provider certification are easy to assume and expensive to discover later.
• The currency, and whether the rate changes if the overlap with your timezone is outside their working day.

A paid trial on one ticket you already understand beats a discount. You learn how they write, how they ask, and how they tell you something is larger than the estimate.

Dedicated means one name

11. Hire a dedicated Laravel developer only if the name stays

If the brief was to hire dedicated laravel developer time, the check is the name on the work. Dedicated means the same Laravel developer writes the code, reviews it, and answers when production breaks. A bench that introduces a new engineer every sprint is a different product. The proposal should say which one you are buying.

I work as one senior engineer in Lahore, remotely. When I take a dedicated engagement, the commits and the conversation are mine. If a proposal says "our team" and the person on the call cannot open the repository, you are hiring a relay, not a developer.

Red flags you can see in the sample

12. The sample is allowed to end the process

I treat these as final. A good call does not cancel them.

• The Laravel code is a public admin theme with the logo changed.
• There are no tests, and the explanation is that they test manually.
• Raw SQL is concatenated with request input.
• The production queue is sync, described as "simpler".
• A real .env is pasted into chat.
• The person who would do the work is not the person who can walk through the diff.
• The fixed price has no definition of done.
• The proposal promises a ranking, a revenue number, or a delivery date with no ticket list behind it.

Any one of those is enough to stop. You do not need all twelve to fail.

A live site is part of the sample

If the work they show you is already on a public domain, request a URL. I want 200 on the page they meant to publish, one canonical, and the H1 in the HTML. I also want a junk path to return 404 or 410, and a sitemap that lists only real pages. That pass is the one I wrote up as a technical SEO checklist. It is the same list I use on Laravel, WordPress, and Next.js.

A maintained domain can still collect URLs nobody wrote. When that happened here, the cleanup was an allowlist and 410 responses, which I documented in how I removed hacked spam URLs from Google. I ask a Laravel developer who inherits a site whether they have done that kind of pass, and whether they can show the status code.

FAQ

What should I check before I hire a Laravel developer?

Open one pull request they authored. Look for a policy, a form request, eager loading on a list that prints relations, a feature test, and a deploy path they have used. Read the rate only after the code holds up.

How do I hire a dedicated Laravel developer?

Use the same twelve checks, and add one commercial check: the name does not change. A dedicated Laravel developer is the person on the commits and on the incident. A rotating bench should be priced and described as a bench.

What do Laravel development services cover?

On this site, Laravel development services means applications, APIs, CRM systems, and business platforms. A store, checkout, or payment integration is ecommerce work. The proposal should name which of those you are buying.

Should the lowest rate win?

No. Compare what the number includes: the person, the cap, the revisions, and the week after release. I do not publish hourly figures by country here. The public numbers I can find are a marketplace price, an old national average, or an agency's own post, and none of those is your project.

Does the Laravel developer also own the public URLs?

The application can be correct and still ship the wrong canonical, or a sitemap full of URLs that should not be indexed. After the feature work, run a technical SEO pass on the URLs a crawler will fetch.

If you want this from me

I am a senior full-stack engineer in Lahore. I take Laravel work directly, and the checklist above is the standard I want on the repository, including on mine.

If you want to hire a Laravel developer for an application, an API, a CRM, or a business platform, start at Laravel development services. If the product is a store or a payment integration, start at ecommerce development. Send the repository, or one ticket you would use as a trial. I will tell you if I am the right person.