Laravel 8, the most recent version of the Laravel framework, was released on September 8. Laravel 8 comes with exciting new features and a guide to upgrade.

1. app/Models Directory

The artisan:make model command will create the model in the app/Models directory. This feature was decided after Taylor asked people on Twitter how they feel about this.

If you don’t like that, it’s possible to delete the app/Models directory and artisan will create the model file in the app/ folder. It’s cool that Laravel is built with so much input from the community!

2. New Landing Page

Laravel 8 comes with a new landing page for a brand new install. It is now redesigned and It is built using TailwindCSS, includes light and dark-mode capabilities, and by default extends links to SaaS products and community sites.

3. Controllers Routing Namespacing

No more double prefix issues! In previous versions of Laravel, the RouteServiceProvider had an attribute called namespace that was used to prefix the controllers in the routes files. That created a problem when you were trying to use a callable syntax on your controllers, causing Laravel to mistakenly double prefix it for you. This attribute was removed and now you can import and use it without the issue.

It can also be used for single action controllers that have the __invoke method.

4. Route Caching

Laravel uses route caching to compile your routes in a PHP array that is more efficient to deal with. In Laravel 8, it’s possible to use this feature even if you have closures as actions to your routes. This should extend the usage of route caching for improved performance.

5. Attributes on Extended Blade Components

In Laravel 7 the child components didn’t have access to the $attributes passed to it. In Laravel 8 these components were enhanced and it is now possible to merge nested component attributes. This makes it easier to create extended components.