Hey there, fellow Laravel developer!
Are you still spending weeks building the same boring admin panel features for every client project? User management, role management, permissions, blog systems, media libraries... the list goes on.
What if I told you there's a 100% free, open-source solution that gives you all of this — and more — out of the box?
Let me introduce you to https://laradashboard.com — your all-in-one marketplace CMS solution for Laravel.
The Pain We All Know Too Well
Every Laravel project starts the same way:
- "I need user authentication with role-based access control"
- "I need a beautiful admin dashboard with charts"
- "I need content management — posts, pages, categories, tags"
- "I need a media library for file uploads"
- "I need email templates and notification management"
- "I need multi-language support"
- "I need activity logging for audit trails"
- "I need REST APIs for mobile apps"
- "Oh, and I need AI-powered content generation because it's 2026"
Sound familiar? You've probably built these features dozens of times. Each time reinventing the wheel, each time spending precious hours on boilerplate instead of your client's actual business logic.
What if you could skip all that and focus on what actually matters?
What is Lara Dashboard?
Lara Dashboard is a complete, production-ready Laravel admin panel and CMS that comes with everything you need to kickstart any Laravel project.
Built on the latest tech stack:
- Laravel 12.x with PHP 8.3/8.4
- Livewire 3 for reactive components
- Tailwind CSS 4 for beautiful, responsive UI
- Alpine.js for lightweight interactivity
- Laravel Pulse for real-time monitoring
- Laravel Sanctum for API authentication
- Pest for modern testing
It's not just another admin template. It's a fully functional application with business logic, services, tests, and a modular architecture that lets you extend it infinitely.
Features That'll Make You Say "Finally!"
User & Access Management
- Complete user CRUD with profile management
- Role-based access control (RBAC) using Spatie Permissions
- Granular permission system with grouped permissions
- Admin impersonation — log in as any user for debugging
- Beautiful user detail pages with activity history
Content Management System (CMS)
- Posts and Pages with visual drag-and-drop builder
- Categories and Tags with hierarchical structure
- SEO-friendly URLs and meta management
- Media library with image optimization
- Content scheduling and drafts
AI-Powered Content Generation
- Built-in AI Agent for content creation
- Support for OpenAI, Anthropic, and other providers
- Inline AI editor for posts and pages
- Fine-tuning options for tone and style
Email Management
- Visual email template builder (drag-and-drop blocks)
- Multiple email connections (SMTP, Mailgun, etc.)
- Inbound and outbound email management
- Notification system with customizable triggers
Translation & Localization
- 21+ languages supported out of the box
- Easy translation management UI
- Add any new language in seconds
- RTL support ready
Monitoring & Security
- Activity logging for every action
- Laravel Pulse integration for real-time metrics
- Laravel Telescope for debugging
- reCAPTCHA integration
- Customizable login page settings
Developer Experience
- Modular architecture — add/remove features as modules
- CRUD Generator — scaffold complete CRUD in one command
- WordPress-like hooks — action/filter system for extensibility
- REST API with auto-generated Scramble documentation
- Comprehensive test suite — Pest, PHPStan, Rector, Pint
The Module System — This Changes Everything
Here's where Lara Dashboard really shines. It uses a modular architecture powered by https://laravelmodules.com/.
This means:
- Install only what you need — Don't need a blog? Don't enable the module.
- Add features via marketplace — Browse and install modules with one click.
- Build your own modules — Create custom functionality that plugs right in.
- Share or sell your modules — Build once, monetize forever.
CRUD Generator — Your New Best Friend
Need to add a new entity to your project? One command does it all:
# Create migration
php artisan module:make-migration create_products_table Shop
# Run migration
php artisan migrate
# Generate complete CRUD
php artisan module:make-crud Shop --migration=create_products_table
What you get:
- Model with fillable fields and casts
- Datatable with sorting, searching, pagination
- Index, Show, Create, Edit Livewire components
- Blade views with breadcrumb navigation
- Routes and sidebar menu item
From zero to fully functional CRUD in under 60 seconds. No joke.
Is It Really Free?
Yes, 100% free and open source.
The core is completely free under the MIT license. You can use it for personal projects, client work, SaaS products — whatever you want.
There are also premium modules available at https://laradashboard.com if you need advanced features like:
- CRM (Customer Relationship Management)
- HRM (Human Resource Management)
- Course Management
- E-commerce
- And more coming...
But the core? Completely free. Forever.
Getting Started in 5 Minutes
# Clone the repo
git clone git@github.com:laradashboard/laradashboard.git
cd laradashboard
# Setup environment
cp .env.example .env
# Install dependencies
composer install
npm install
# Generate key and link storage
php artisan key:generate
php artisan storage:link
# Run migrations with seed data
php artisan migrate:fresh --seed
# Start the server
composer run dev
Open http://localhost:8000 and log in:
- Email: superadmin@example.com
- Password: 12345678
That's it. You now have a fully functional admin panel.
Try Before You Clone
Want to see it in action first?
Live Demo: https://demo.laradashboard.com?source=dev.to
Email: superadmin@example.com
Password: 12345678
Play around. Break things. The demo resets automatically.
Documentation That Actually Helps
We've invested heavily in documentation because we know how frustrating bad docs can be.
Full documentation: https://laradashboard.com/docs
Covers everything from:
- Installation and configuration
- User and role management
- Module development
- CRUD generator usage
- API integration
- Deployment guides
- And much more...
The Tech Stack You'll Love
| Technology | Version | Purpose |
|-------------------|---------|-------------------------|
| Laravel | 12.x | Backend framework |
| PHP | 8.3+ | Server-side language |
| Livewire | 3.x | Reactive components |
| Tailwind CSS | 4.x | Styling |
| Alpine.js | 3.x | Frontend interactivity |
| Laravel Pulse | 1.5 | Real-time monitoring |
| Laravel Sanctum | 4.3 | API authentication |
| Laravel Telescope | 5.17 | Debugging |
| Pest | 4.x | Testing |
| React | 18.x | Page builder components |
All the modern tools. All working together. All tested.
Deployment Made Easy
Lara Dashboard works everywhere:
- VPS/Dedicated servers — Standard Laravel deployment
- Shared hosting (cPanel) — Root index.php included, no document root changes needed
- Docker — Laravel Sail support built-in
- Cloud platforms — Works with Forge, Vapor, DigitalOcean, AWS, etc.
We even have a distribution package builder that creates production-ready ZIP files with vendor dependencies included — perfect for clients who can't run Composer.
Join the Community
Lara Dashboard is built by developers, for developers. We'd love to have you:
- GitHub: https://github.com/laradashboard/laradashboard
- Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/laradashboard
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/14690156
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@laradashboard (tutorials coming!)
Contributing
Found a bug? Have a feature idea? PRs are always welcome!
The codebase follows strict standards:
- Pint for code formatting
- PHPStan/Larastan for static analysis
- Rector for automated refactoring
- Pest for testing
Run composer run test and everything is checked automatically.
Why Choose Lara Dashboard?
| Feature | Building from Scratch | Lara Dashboard |
|--------------------|-----------------------|----------------|
| User Management | Hours/Days | Included |
| Role & Permissions | Hours | Included |
| CMS (Posts, Pages) | Days | Included |
| Media Library | Hours | Included |
| Email Management | Hours | Included |
| AI Integration | Days | Included |
| Multi-language | Hours | Included |
| Activity Logging | Hours | Included |
| REST API | Days | Included |
| Monitoring | Hours | Included |
| Beautiful UI | Days | Included |
| Tests | Days | Included |
| Total | Weeks | Minutes |
The math speaks for itself.
Final Thoughts
Stop reinventing the wheel. Stop building the same features over and over. Stop wasting time on boilerplate.
Lara Dashboard gives you a 6-month head start on every Laravel project.
Clone it. Customize it. Ship it.
Your clients will thank you. Your deadline will thank you. Your sanity will thank you.
Ready to try it?
- Demo: https://demo.laradashboard.com?source=dev.to
- GitHub: https://github.com/laradashboard/laradashboard
- Docs: https://laradashboard.com/docs
Drop a star on GitHub if you find it useful. And let me know in the comments what features you'd love to see next!
Happy coding!
Built with love by the Laravel community. Powered by Lara Dashboard.
Top comments (5)
Pardon for being sceptical, but the biggest question - why use this over some really solid things like Filament? Moonshine? These ecosystems are 100 times more functional, 100 times more modules, a large community, good documentations and so on.
And the demo is not available. I mean, if it is gate-walled with "ask for demo" and personal details, god knows why it is collected and how justified... then it is not a demo, it is immediately closed tab.
Hi Stas, Thanks for the feedback.
It has tons of advance things built on its core, which could take you a lots of time to build on your own. If you give it a quick try.
And the marketplace/module based architecture it built would be outbreaking soon.
And thanks for feedback about demo, thats right, we've made that open now, with no data taking - demo.laradashboard.com/
Hm, can you please name a few? A nice comparison table in the post would be appreciated. As I think Filament has almost everything you can think of, and if it does not, then there is aplugin for it. And compared to laradashboard - there are 660 of them in Filament versus just 5 or so.
Hi Stas, Sure, I'll add the comparison table definitely, thanks for the idea to add the comparison.
Basically, Lara Dashboard is not compared to Filament in many terms. Its a complete marketplace which is way more extendible then Filament. You can compare it to WordPress, Shopify, Magento platforms but build on top of Laravel, Livewire. It should not be comparable to filament.
Building a simple application in Filament is very easy, but in production and practical sense, most of the application doesn't stays being that simple and with grown complexity its taking more and more time to manage that with just simple filament way.
I'm just adding a couple things here for your idea if you check if Filament is providing that
Its more modular and extendible - You can extend every tiny little peice of the application. It has this module marketplace - laradashboard.com/marketplace
Email management is supported out of the box - Email connections - Inbound, Outbound, Templates, Notifications, Email builder in a complete flow.
That means using this, you can build entire application with page building easily and from any module, you can build a block and make that happen quick.
There are tons of things like this I can mention.
you can say, this is possible in Filament, I will say 100%, definitely. But if you try to build this in Filament, you will say maybe 99% time, no, no need, no need that much to be advanced.
I can say, filament is Good, but if you try Lara Dashboard once, you'll love it and you may forget about Filament for your next project.
But its right, that its a a baby still and growing, We did not do any marketing so far. Hope it will surfass filament and all one day and compete with WordPress.
That is quite a detailed reply, thank you :)
I think all of that (or the vast majority) is achievable via Filament via plugins, but I can agree that Filament has a learning curve and that it can be quite tricky to operate with all the "zoo" of plugins.