Server requirements for PHP version

Question

The new documentation mentions 5.3.7 as the php version requirement. Although looking through the current composer.lock file 5.3.3 would do fine?

Answer 1

Laravel requires 5.3.7, so get at least that. I recommend (if possible) you upgrade to 5.4 anyway. Laravel requires the password_compat package and that package requires at least PHP 5.3.7. The reason:

The reason for this is that PHP prior to 5.3.7 contains a security issue with its BCRYPT implementation. Therefore, it's highly recommended that you upgrade to a newer version of PHP prior to using this layer.

If you do use a lower PHP version beware.

If you attempt to use password-compat on an unsupported version, attempts to create or verify hashes will return false. You have been warned!

Answer 2

There are also a certain amount of PHP extensions required to use some bits of the built in stuff in laravel. For example yesterday I noticed the file upload requires the fileinfo extension to gather information.

Unsure if that's noted anywhere in the docs. Laravel does give you a 500 error though to let you know if extensions are missing.