Laravel 11: release date and new features

Laravel is a powerful and flexible PHP web framework that has gained huge popularity in the web development world.

It provides developers with a rich set of tools and features that make it easier to build robust and scalable web applications.

Laravel’s 11th version will be out next year, and we already now a few things about it already.

When will Laravel 11 be released?

According to the Support Policy, Laravel 11 is scheduled to be released in February 6th, 2024.

The release of Laravel 11 doesn’t mean you have to update all your projects immediately, though.

The framework last had LTS (Long-Term Support) in version 6, but each major version has two years of updates, which should give you enough time to get your codebase in check and upgrade it.

Laravel 10 will receive bug fixes until August 6th, 2024 and security fixes until February 4th, 2025.

Version	PHP	Release	Bug fixes until	Security fixes until
10	8.1	February 14, 2023	August 6th, 2024	February 4th, 2025
11	8.2	Q1 2024	August 5th, 2025	February 3rd, 2026

How to install Laravel 11?

The Laravel installer has a --dev flag, which installs the master branch from the laravel/laravel repository.

laravel new hello-world --dev

Or, if you prefer to explicitly use Composer:

composer create-project --prefer-dist laravel/laravel hello-world dev-master

What’s new in Laravel 11: features and changes

Dropped support for PHP 8.1

When Laravel 11 will be released, PHP 8.3 will also be in the wild. With support for 8.2 and 8.3, the framework can move forward and abandon 8.1.

But remember: your Laravel apps don’t need to be updated to the latest and greatest as soon as they’re released.

Especially if you have projects with paid clients or employees who depend on them to do their work.

Those projects need to slowly but surely move forward by doing extensive testing. Don’t rush.

See the pull request on GitHub: [11.x] Drop PHP 8.1 support

The Dumpable concern (dump() and dd() from your objects)

This pull request introduces a new Dumpable trait, intended to replace the current dd and dump methods in most of Laravel’s classes.

The trait allows Laravel users and package authors to include debugging methods easily within their classes by utilizing this trait.

Here’s a code example showing how it can be used:

<?php
 
namespace App\ValueObjects;
 
use Illuminate\Support\Traits\Dumpable;
use Illuminate\Support\Traits\Conditionable;
 
class Address
{
    use Conditionable, Dumpable;
 
    // ...
}
 
$address = new Address;
 
// Before:
$address->foo()->bar();
 
// After:
$address->foo()->dd()->bar();

See the pull request on GitHub: [11.x] Adds Dumpable concern

Laravel 11 release preparation

Here is a list of every merged PR I found to prepare Laravel 11 release:

• [11.x] Set up Laravel v11
• [11.x] Update Testbench dependencies for Laravel 11

How to contribute to Laravel 11?

Did you know you can create the next big feature for Laravel 11?

1. See what’s going on for Laravel 11 on GitHub: https://github.com/laravel/framework/pulls. The Pull Requests will tell you what’s already been done.
2. Take one of your pain points with the framework and create a solution yourself.
3. Send the PR over to the laravel/framework repository, collect feedback, improve and get merged.

One important tip to increase your chances of being merged: add something to the framework that’s a win for developers, but not a pain to maintain for Taylor and his team in the long run.

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This is what’s new in Laravel 11 for now.

There’s more to come until February 2024, though.

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