- Is liberusoftware/boilerplate-laravel a Composer package I can require?
- Despite the vendor/package naming, it is an application skeleton you fork or clone rather than a library you pull in with composer require. There is no semver contract protecting you and no vendor upgrade path, so every line becomes your code the moment you branch. Treat the decision as buy vs. build vs. fork on a starting line, not as adopting a dependency.
- What Laravel, PHP, Filament and Livewire versions does it target?
- The boilerplate is pinned to Laravel 13, PHP 8.5, Filament 5 and Livewire 4, with Jetstream and Socialite layered on top. That means four simultaneously-new majors in one lockfile, so confirm the committed composer.lock actually resolves on a clean clone. Also verify PHP 8.5 is available on your production host and CI image, not just on your local machine, since that is the sharpest practical gate.
- What features ship out of the box?
- The documented stack is a first-party authenticated app shell via Jetstream (auth, teams, 2FA, API tokens, profile management), a reactive Livewire 4 UI layer, Filament 5 back-office panels, and social sign-in through Socialite. It front-loads weeks of scaffolding if your product matches that shape: a customer-facing dashboard plus an internal admin console. Billing, tenancy isolation and audit logging are not named in the description, so verify each before assuming they are included.
- Does it include SaaS billing, subscriptions or plan gating?
- Billing is not mentioned in the package description, which is a notable gap for something marketed as a SaaS boilerplate. If Cashier with Stripe or Paddle, plan and entitlement gating, webhook handling and dunning are absent, the most expensive and most compliance-sensitive slice of your product is still yours to build. Check the repository directly before committing, because the headline value drops materially without it.
- How do I install or get started with it?
- Clone or fork the repository rather than requiring it through Composer, then install dependencies, configure your .env, and run migrations against a PHP 8.5 runtime. The supplied documentation follows what is essentially a happy path built around the maintainer's tooling, so read it end to end before starting. If you are spiking the stack, timebox the install and resolution step first, because a broken lockfile is the fastest way to burn a week.
- Do I need Podman or the lerd dev environment to use it?
- The repo documentation is dominated by lerd, a Podman-based local dev environment with its own MCP tooling, site linking, workers, DNS modes and worktree subdomains. That is a legitimate DX opinion, but none of it should be a prerequisite for CI or for a new hire on a non-Linux laptop. Confirm that a plain composer install plus artisan commands work independently of lerd before standardizing on this skeleton.
- Does it support multi-tenancy?
- The description does not state a tenancy model, so you need to determine whether it is single-database with a tenant scope or database-per-tenant, and how that boundary is enforced. Critically, check whether Filament panels respect the same tenant scope, since an admin console that ignores tenancy is a data-leak surface. If multi-tenancy is core to your product, budget time to verify or build isolation rather than trusting the label.
- How do I keep the boilerplate updated after forking?
- You do not, in any automated sense. Once you branch, upstream becomes reference-only and any future changes require a manual merge or cherry-pick, which is the accepted cost of forking an application skeleton. Plan for that up front: keep your customizations isolated where possible so upstream diffs stay reviewable, and expect the maintainer's cadence to be your only signal.
- Is it production ready, and what are the main risks?
- The ranked risks are the bleeding-edge version matrix becoming unresolvable, boilerplate code going unmaintained after fork, and hidden scope gaps such as billing or tenancy. It also has a small maintainer footprint (roughly 204 stars, no commercial backing or SLA), so due diligence is on you. Before shipping, harden the Filament admin panel with an IP allowlist or a separate guard, and review Socialite account-linking flows carefully since that is a classic account-takeover surface.
- Is it a good fit for an API-first, headless or single-tenant app?
- Not really. If your product is API-first, headless or internal single-tenant tooling, roughly half the stack, including Jetstream teams, social auth and Filament panels, is dead weight you will carry and patch. The fit is high for a multi-tenant subscription SaaS with a customer dashboard plus an admin console, where the scaffolding pays for itself immediately. Evaluate against your archetype before forking, and check whether CI exists and passes on a clean clone as a proxy for overall health.