Laragen: Automatic OpenAPI Generation

Laragen provides zero-config OpenAPI generation for Laravel applications. It analyzes your codebase and generates comprehensive API documentation with minimal setup.

What Laragen Does

Laragen inspects your Laravel application and auto-generates OpenAPI schemas by analyzing:

• Route discovery — finds API routes by URI patterns (no annotations needed)
• Path parameters — infers types from route constraints (whereUuid, whereNumber, etc.)
• Request body schemas — from FormRequest validation rules, Spatie Data objects, or docblock annotations
• Response schemas — from JsonResource, ResourceCollection, Spatie Data, Fractal Transformer, Eloquent Model, or docblock annotations
• Authentication — detects auth middleware and generates SecurityScheme components

Supported Auto-Detection

Request Body

Source	Description
@bodyParam annotations	Explicit parameter definitions in docblocks
@queryParam annotations	Explicit query parameter definitions in docblocks
Spatie Data objects	Type-hinted Data parameters in controller methods
FormRequest rules	Laravel validation rules converted to JSON Schema

Response Schema

Source	Description
@response annotations	Explicit JSON response examples in docblocks
ResourceCollection	Detects ResourceCollection return types
JsonResource	Analyzes toArray() method AST
Spatie Data	Analyzes Data class constructor parameters
Fractal Transformer	Analyzes transform() method AST
Eloquent Model	Infers schema from $casts, $hidden, $appends

Detection strategies are tried in the order listed above. The first match wins.

Configuration

Publish the config file:

php artisan vendor:publish --tag=laragen-config

config/laragen.php

return [
    'enabled' => env('LARAGEN_ENABLED', true),
    'docs_path' => '.laragen/openapi.json',

    'route_discovery' => [
        'mode' => 'attribute', // 'auto' | 'attribute' | 'combined'
        'include' => ['api/*'],
        'exclude' => ['api/admin/*', 'api/telescope/*', 'api/horizon/*'],
    ],

    'autogen' => [
        'request_body' => true,
        'example' => true,
        'security' => true,
        'path_parameters' => true,
        'response' => true,
    ],

    'strategies' => [
        'request' => [
            'prepend' => [], // Custom strategies before built-in
            'append' => [],  // Custom strategies after built-in
        ],
        'response' => [
            'prepend' => [],
            'append' => [],
        ],
    ],
];

Route Discovery Modes

Mode	Behavior
attribute	Only routes with #[Collection] attribute
auto	Routes matching include patterns (excluding exclude patterns)
combined	Both attributed and pattern-matched routes

Usage

Generate the OpenAPI spec:

php artisan laragen:generate

The generated spec is available at the configured docs_path and served at /laragen/docs.