Laravel 7

Laravel 7 added several application-facing features on top of Laravel 6: an HTTP client built around Guzzle, tag-based Blade components with improved component APIs, custom Eloquent cast classes, query-time casts, fluent string operations, configurable scoped route model binding, first-party CORS configuration, and support for multiple mailers. It also introduced API-token authentication through Laravel Airlock, later renamed Laravel Sanctum. These additions gave applications more framework-native options for outbound HTTP calls, reusable UI components, data transformation, routing, and API authentication, while retaining the established Laravel 6 application structure.

Laravel 7 has reached end of life, so framework security fixes, bug fixes, and compatibility updates are no longer provided for this line. An application can continue to run, but defects or vulnerabilities in Laravel 7 or its supported integration surface must be mitigated locally, accepted as operational risk, or addressed by upgrading. Dependency maintenance becomes progressively harder as Composer packages, PHP versions, database drivers, and deployment images move beyond the versions tested with Laravel 7. Teams may also face greater upgrade effort later because they must cross several major-version upgrade boundaries at once, and application packages may remove compatibility with Laravel 7 before the application is migrated.

Plan a supported-target upgrade rather than treating Laravel 7 as a stable long-term baseline. First, inventory the application’s PHP version, Composer dependencies, first-party Laravel packages, authentication approach, mail configuration, queue workers, and custom framework extensions. Review the official upgrade guidance for every intervening major release and apply required changes in sequence, even if the code is ultimately moved to a current supported Laravel release. Update or replace packages that do not support the selected target, and verify whether any Airlock-era code should use the current Sanctum package and APIs. Build automated coverage around authentication, authorization, route model binding, Eloquent serialization and casting, queued jobs, mail delivery, filesystem access, and external HTTP integrations before upgrading. Perform the migration in a non-production environment with production-like data and services, run dependency and security scans, then deploy with a rollback plan and monitoring for application errors, queue failures, and integration regressions.