To install Laravel 8, follow these steps:

1. Install PHP & Required Extensions

Ensure your system meets Laravel 8's requirements:

• PHP ≥ 7.3
• Required extensions:
  • OpenSSL
  • PDO
  • Mbstring
  • Tokenizer
  • XML
  • Ctype
  • JSON
  • BCMath
  • Fileinfo

Check your PHP version:

php -v

2. Install Composer

Laravel requires Composer, a PHP dependency manager.
Download and install Composer from getcomposer.org.
Verify installation:

composer -V

3. Install Laravel 8 Using Composer

Run the following command to create a new Laravel 8 project:

composer create-project --prefer-dist laravel/laravel project_name "8.*"

Replace project_name with your desired project folder name.

Alternatively, you can use the Laravel installer:

composer global require laravel/installer
laravel new project_name --version="8.*"

4. Configure Environment

Navigate to the project directory:

cd project_name

Copy .env.example to .env:

cp .env.example .env

Generate the application key:

php artisan key:generate

5. Configure Database

Edit .env and set up your database connection:

DB_CONNECTION=mysql
DB_HOST=127.0.0.1
DB_PORT=3306
DB_DATABASE=your_database
DB_USERNAME=your_username
DB_PASSWORD=your_password

Run migrations (if needed):

php artisan migrate

6. Start Laravel Development Server

Run:

php artisan serve

Your Laravel application will be available at:

http://127.0.0.1:8000

That's it! 🎉 Laravel 8 is now installed and running. Let me know if you need help! 🚀😊