performance

When to use

Use when optimizing slow endpoints, designing caching, or improving query performance.

Do NOT use when:

• Database schema design (use database skill)
• Queue job creation (use jobs-events skill)

Procedure: Optimize performance

Step 0: Identify the bottleneck

1. Don't optimize prematurely — measure first.
2. Use DB::enableQueryLog() or Telescope to find slow queries.
3. Check for N+1 queries on list endpoints.
4. Search for existing cache services in the project.

Performance complexity is a claim, and a claim needs evidence. No cache layer, no denormalised column, no materialised view, no read replica ships on "this will be slow" — it ships on a profile, a query log, or a timing that names the bottleneck. The added complexity is permanent (invalidation bugs, stale reads, a second source of truth); the speedup is hypothetical until measured. State the measurement in the change, or do not add the mechanism.

Carve-out — this does not override the scale-discipline floor. Where that pack is installed, R-A2 mandates an index on every FK and every WHERE / ORDER BY column, and R-A4 governs duplicated data by waiver. Those are structural defaults that ship with the query, not optimisations awaiting a profiler; the evidence gate above applies to added mechanisms (caches, denormalisation, replicas, bespoke indexes beyond parity), never to the floor's baseline.

Step 1: Apply the right fix

Bottleneck	Fix
N+1 queries	Eager loading with with()
Slow queries	Add indexes, optimize (see database skill)
Repeated expensive queries	Cache with TTL
Blocking API calls	Queue as background job
Large datasets	Paginate, chunk, cursor
Missing counts	withCount() instead of loading relations

Step 2: Verify

Re-measure after fix. Check that cache invalidation works correctly.

Conventions

→ See guideline php/performance.md for caching patterns, Redis, response time targets.

Output format

1. Optimized code with before/after performance comparison
2. Caching strategy or query optimization applied

Gotcha

• Cache invalidation bugs are worse than slow queries — don't add caching everywhere.
• Eager loading N+1 is the #1 win — always check list endpoints.
• Don't cache ORM collections/entities with loaded relations (Eloquent, Doctrine, Prisma) — too large.
• Always include tenant ID in cache keys (multi-tenant).

Do NOT

• Do NOT cache without tenant isolation in multi-tenant contexts.
• Do NOT use get() or all() on large tables — paginate or chunk.
• Do NOT add indexes blindly — analyze query patterns first.

Auto-trigger keywords

• performance
• caching
• eager loading
• query optimization
• Redis