5 months, one developer, one CRM – what I learned building with Laravel + Livewire

Building an Open-Source CRM in Five Months: Lessons Learned as a Solo Developer Using Laravel and Livewire

Embarking on the journey to develop an open-source Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system, I dedicated five months to transforming an idea into a tangible product. Working solo, I navigated the challenges and celebrated the successes along the way. Here’s a comprehensive overview of my insights and experiences from this project.

Highlights of the Development Experience

Impressive Tools and Frameworks

One of the standout aspects of this project was utilizing Filament, an innovative admin panel library. Remarkably, what could have taken weeks to develop manually, I achieved in just a few days with Filament’s capabilities.

Pairing Laravel with Livewire proved to be an exceptional choice for solo development. This combination eliminated the need for separate APIs and front-end frameworks, streamlining the entire process.

Additionally, modern PHP has become surprisingly enjoyable to work with. With a high level of typing (around 99.6%) and PHPStan at level 7, I maintained robust code quality and caught issues early in development.

Challenges Faced and Lessons Learned

Managing Custom Fields at Scale

Initially, adding custom fields seemed straightforward. However, as each CRM record accumulated over 50 custom fields, I noticed significant performance degradation. Page load times soared from approximately 250 milliseconds to over two seconds.

This issue was resolved through optimized eager loading strategies and implementing effective caching mechanisms.

Target Audience and Product Focus

Designing a product intended “for everyone” quickly became apparent as a mistake—it resulted in a bloated, unfocused application. Narrowing the target audience to small teams allowed me to tailor features more precisely and deliver a better user experience.

Open Source Requires Dedication

Contributing to open source isn’t just about releasing code; it demands ongoing maintenance and support. It’s a serious commitment, and balancing this with other responsibilities is essential.

Key Technical Decisions that Delivered Results

Adhering to Laravel Conventions: While it might seem uninspired, sticking to Laravel’s best practices accelerated development and facilitated maintainability.
Early Adoption of PHPStan: Starting static analysis from day one helped me catch bugs early, saving time and reducing technical debt.
Choosing Filament for Admin UI: Instead of building backend interfaces from scratch, leveraging Filament dramatically reduced development time and enhanced usability.

Reflection: Timeframes and Expectations

Comple