- What does jijunair/laravel-referral do?
- It is a Laravel package that adds referral program functionality to your application. It lets you generate referral links or codes, track invites and signups, associate users with the referrer who invited them, and award configurable rewards or credits through a simple API. It is Laravel-native, so it typically ships with a service provider, configuration file, migrations, and a trait or model concern for your User model.
- How do I install and configure jijunair/laravel-referral?
- Install it with Composer, then publish the package config and migrations and run them against a staging database first. Add the package trait or concern to your User model and wire up the referral capture routes or middleware in your signup flow. Review the published migration schema before running it in production rather than executing vendor migrations blindly, and backfill referral codes if you already have existing users.
- Which Laravel and PHP versions does this referral package support?
- The package is described as Laravel-native, but the exact supported Laravel and PHP version ranges should be confirmed in its composer.json and README before you commit. Check whether a CI or test matrix exists, since the repository has relatively low community signal at around 97 stars. Validate compatibility against your host application's Laravel version, PHP version, auth guard, and database driver in a feature branch before adoption.
- How does referral code generation and attribution work in this package?
- The package generates referral links or codes and associates a new signup with the referring user, but the exact capture mechanism should be verified in the source. Attribution is commonly done through a URL query parameter, cookie, session value, or explicit API payload, and the attribution window and precedence rules matter for correctness. Confirm how codes are persisted between the invite click and the signup completion in your specific frontend pattern.
- How do I award rewards or credits when a referred user signs up?
- Rewards are described as configurable and exposed through a simple API, but you should check whether the package emits events, hardcodes reward logic, or leaves fulfillment to the host app. In most integrations you listen for the referral or signup event and apply credits inside your own service or queued job. Make reward issuance idempotent in your application code so a retried job or duplicate signup cannot double-spend credits.
- Does laravel-referral prevent self-referral and duplicate referral codes?
- The package generates referral codes, but you should confirm in the migrations whether unique constraints exist at the database level for codes and one-referral-per-user. Fraud controls such as blocking self-referral, duplicate accounts, disposable email addresses, and rate limiting are typically not complete in a small package and often need to be added by the host app. Treat these checks as required hardening before enabling any monetary incentive.
- Can I use this Laravel referral package with an API, Sanctum, or a SPA or mobile client?
- It fits a conventional Laravel web app or API using Eloquent auth, but cookie or session based attribution may not map cleanly to token-based APIs and mobile clients. If you use Sanctum or a SPA, verify how the referral code is passed and persisted, such as an explicit signup payload field. Test the flow end to end with your actual auth guard before relying on it.
- Does it work with UUID or ULID users, soft deletes, or multi-tenant applications?
- The package likely assumes a standard auto-incrementing users table, so UUID or ULID keys, soft deletes, and tenant scoping should be checked in the migration and model code. Multi-tenant SaaS and microservice architectures are a weaker fit unless the package is inspected and probably forked. Build a small compatibility matrix covering ID strategy, database driver, tenancy, and queue workers before committing.
- Is jijunair/laravel-referral production-ready or should I fork it?
- Treat it as an accelerator or reference implementation rather than a strategic dependency, especially since it has limited community signal and no vendor SLA under its MIT license. It is high fit for a prototype and medium-low fit for production until code review confirms test coverage, migration quality, uniqueness constraints, transaction handling, and reward idempotency. If referrals are a core growth loop with monetary incentives, adopt it only with an internal owner and hardening work.
- What are the alternatives and maintenance considerations for Laravel referral packages?
- The MIT license reduces lock-in and permits a clean fork, but it also means there is no commercial support or security disclosure process to rely on. Check the maintainer's responsiveness, release cadence, and whether the package depends on fragile framework internals that would complicate upgrades. If your requirements include admin reporting, audit logs, localization, or reward clawback, plan to build those yourself or evaluate a more actively maintained alternative.