Laravel 12 Highlights
Laravel 12 continues the tradition of streamlining the framework while adding powerful new capabilities. The most significant change is the new application skeleton which removes several files that were rarely modified by developers.
New Directory Structure
The app/Http/Kernel.php file is gone. Middleware registration is now done via the application bootstrap file, making the structure much cleaner.
Performance Improvements
Laravel 12 ships with an overhauled query builder that reduces memory usage by up to 30% for large dataset operations. The Eloquent eager loading algorithm has been rewritten to use fewer SQL queries in complex relationship chains.
New Features
- Native enum casting improvements
- New
when()method on collections - Improved rate limiting API
- Built-in health check endpoints
Laravel 12 is the most polished release yet. The reduced boilerplate lets developers focus on building features rather than configuration.