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Laravel developer hourly rates by country (2026)

How much does it cost to hire a Laravel developer? It depends mostly on where the developer lives and how senior they are. A senior freelance Laravel developer typically charges $80–$130 per hour in the United States, $45–$80 in Poland, $40–$75 in Brazil and $25–$50 in India.

With EliteBrains you pay the developer’s own rate. No markup, no commission on top.

Methodology: ranges compiled from published 2026 rate benchmarks (Second Talent, Lemon.io and others), rounded to the nearest $5. Rates vary by stack, seniority and project. Last updated October 2026.

Want to use these numbers in your article? Feel free, just mention EliteBrains and link to this page.

Which Laravel developer do you need?

Laravel developers are not all the same. Start with what you’re building, then look for the matching skills. Not sure which one fits? Tell us about your project and we’ll help you figure it out.

Not sure if you need Laravel at all? If your project runs on WordPress or Symfony, look for a PHP developer with that experience instead. For an existing Symfony app, a Symfony consultant can tell you whether to keep it or move to Laravel. Every Laravel developer is a PHP developer first.

Hire a Laravel Developer

If you’re reading this, you probably have a Laravel app already, or you’re about to build one. Either way, you need someone who really knows it. Here’s what we at EliteBrains have learned about finding them.

Laravel is a PHP framework for building web apps, APIs and SaaS products. It gives developers ready-made tools for the things almost every app needs: logins, database work, emails, background jobs, and tests. That is why skilled Laravel developers can build a working product quickly and keep the code tidy as it grows.

Laravel is the most popular PHP framework. About two out of three PHP developers use it. That makes it much more common than WordPress (25%) or Symfony (23%). Laravel also has its own tools that save developers time: Livewire for interactive pages, Filament for admin panels, and Forge and Laravel Cloud for putting the app online.

So when you hire a Laravel developer, you’re really hiring a PHP developer who knows these tools well. Below you’ll find what to look for, how to test candidates and what it costs.

Laravel vs Symfony vs WordPress

Most companies that hire Laravel programmers have looked at the other big PHP options too. All three are good. They just suit different projects:

If your app already runs on Laravel, hire a Laravel developer. If you are starting a custom web app from zero, Laravel is the easiest to staff. For a content website, a WordPress developer is usually enough.

What companies build with Laravel

Laravel is used most where a business needs a custom web app, not just a website. Here is what teams usually build with it, and the industries that often hire Laravel developers:

• SaaS products. Subscription apps, customer portals and dashboards, often with Stripe payments.
• E-commerce. Custom online shops, marketplaces, and booking and ticket systems.
• Fintech and insurance. Client portals, payments and reports, where security is critical.
• Healthcare. Patient portals and appointment systems that must protect personal data.
• Education. Learning platforms and course sites.
• Agencies and startups. Client projects, and the first version of a product built fast by one full-stack developer.

Ask candidates to show you something they built in your industry. It’s one of the most useful questions you can ask. A Laravel developer who has already built a booking system or a client portal will be faster on yours.

Skills to look for when you hire a Laravel developer

If we were hiring a Laravel developer for you, these are the things we’d check:

• Current Laravel and PHP: Laravel 12 or 13 and PHP 8.3 or newer. Laravel 13 came out in March 2026.
• Databases: good SQL, and pages that don’t slow down because of too many database queries.
• Background jobs: sending emails, importing data and taking payments in the background, so the app stays fast.
• APIs: connecting your app to mobile apps and other systems, with secure logins.
• Testing: automatic tests (Pest or PHPUnit) that run before every release.
• Security: checking everything users type in, and making sure each user only sees their own data.
• The front end: Livewire, or Vue or React, depending on your app.
• Getting the app live: putting the app online and keeping it running, with Forge, Laravel Cloud or Docker.

Do you need a Livewire or Filament developer?

Many Laravel apps today are built with two tools from the Laravel world. Livewire lets developers build interactive pages in PHP, without a separate JavaScript front end. Filament is built on Livewire and gives you admin panels, forms and tables very quickly.

You probably need a developer with Livewire or Filament experience if:

• your app already uses them
• you need an admin panel, a back office or an internal tool fast
• your team is small and you want one developer for the whole app, without a separate front-end developer

For small teams, this is often the fastest way to get a working product. If your front end is a separate Vue or React app, look for Inertia.js or API experience instead.

Upgrading an old Laravel app

Laravel 11 stopped getting security fixes on March 12, 2026, and Laravel 10 and older even earlier. Many companies still run apps on these versions, so an upgrade is one of the most common reasons to hire a Laravel developer today.

If your app is on an older version, don’t worry. Upgrading is mostly routine work, not a big rewrite:

1. Check the app. List the packages that don’t support the new Laravel version yet and the parts with no tests.
2. Add tests first. Tests on the most important flows show if anything breaks during the upgrade.
3. Upgrade one version at a time. Ready-made upgrade tools do much of the routine work.
4. Upgrade PHP too. Laravel 13 needs PHP 8.3 or newer, so plan the server change.

Ask candidates if they have done an upgrade like this before and how long it took.

How to vet a Laravel developer before you hire

Almost every PHP developer puts “Laravel” on their CV, so a CV alone tells you very little. A good interview isn’t proof either. The best test is simple: give them a real task, like the work they would do for you, and see how they solve it. Here’s how to do it:

1. Look at their code. Ask for a GitHub profile or a code sample from a past Laravel project.
2. Give them a practical task. A short task from your real project tells you more than trick questions about PHP.
3. Ask how they use AI. Most developers now code with AI tools. A good developer can explain and check the code the AI writes.
4. Check communication. Remote work goes well when the developer writes clear updates and shares some working hours with your team.
5. Start small. A small first project shows you if they deliver on time before you sign a long contract.

Example tasks to test Laravel developers

Pick one or two that are close to your real work. An hour on a task like this tells you more than a week of interviews.

• API: build a small API that lists and adds orders, checks the input and comes with one test.
• Slow page: this page runs 300 database queries. Find out why and bring the number down.
• Background job: import a file of 5,000 customers without the app timing out.
• Security: here is code that saves what users type in. Find the two security problems and fix them.
• Livewire or Filament: build a filterable list of customers with a form to edit them.
• Upgrade: move a small Laravel 10 app to Laravel 13 and make sure all the tests still pass.
• AI code review: here are 60 lines of Laravel code written by AI. Find the two bugs and explain them.

Interview questions that show real skill

With the EliteBrains AI skills assessment, you can send tasks like these to the candidates you like. Our AI checks their answers and code, so you only interview people who can really do the work. It costs $14.90 per candidate. For more ideas, see our backend interview questions and our guide to hiring PHP developers.

Common mistakes when hiring Laravel developers

We’ve seen all of these happen. The good news: each one is easy to avoid once you know about it.

• Hiring for old Laravel. A lot of Laravel experience out there is from Laravel 5 to 8. Ask about Laravel 12 or 13 and look at recent code.
• Only checking Laravel, not PHP. Laravel makes a lot easy. Strong PHP, SQL and debugging skills are what really make a developer good.
• Skipping a real task. Talking about Laravel is easy. Building a small feature with a test in an hour shows you much more.
• Forgetting about security. Ask how they handle user input, logins and permissions. Many problems come from careless code, not from Laravel.
• No overlap in working hours. A great developer with zero shared hours can still slow your team down. Aim for at least a few hours a day together.
• Paying a marketplace markup without knowing it. Many platforms add 15–50% on top of the developer’s rate. Ask what the developer actually gets.

Where to hire Laravel developers

You can find Laravel developers on talent marketplaces, through agencies, on job boards, in the Laravel community or in your own network. Marketplaces and agencies are fast, but they usually add 15–50% on top of the developer’s rate, and you often don’t know how much the developer actually gets.

If you want to choose developers yourself, EliteBrains gives you the tools to do it. Our AI sourcing finds Laravel developers who match what you need, our AI skills assessment checks their skills, and we take care of the contract and payments. You pay no commission on the developer’s rate.

Freelance, contract or dedicated Laravel developers?

Laravel developers for hire usually work in one of three ways. Which one is best depends on how long you need them and how important the work is for your product.

Hiring a dedicated Laravel developer in another country is where many companies get stuck. You want someone full-time, but you don’t have a company in their country. With EliteBrains as your Contractor of Record, we sign the contract, take care of the legal side and pay the developer in their country. You don’t need to open a company there. If you want to sign the contract yourself, you can still pay international contractors through EliteBrains and keep contracts, timesheets and invoices in one place.

Hire a Laravel Developer on EliteBrains

With EliteBrains AI tools you find, check and hire Laravel developers yourself. You decide who you hire, and you never pay a commission on the developer’s rate. It works in four simple steps:

1. Tell us who you need. The tech stack, seniority, location, budget and when they should start. It takes about 5 minutes.
2. Get matching candidates. Our AI sourcing finds up to 50 Laravel developers who fit your needs for $99. Pick the ones you like and we help you start the conversation.
3. Test the best ones. Send an AI skills assessment for $14.90 per candidate and only interview those who pass.
4. Sign and pay. EliteBrains acts as Contractor of Record for $199 per contract per month. We handle the contract, legal rules, timesheets, invoices and payments in the developer’s country.

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