I am going to start using Laravel for my pet projects since it has an entire developer-focused ecosystem. Lots of integrations are already built-in as separate addons/extensions. This should not be confused with WordPress plugins since, in Laravel we still got to code somewhere to integrate these moving parts.

One thing I am not into is getting my hands dirty on a raw server. So I had to choose a control panel for these new Laravel projects. All have git integrations and all have a free tier which I won't be getting into. I assume this is for serious business and hence no free lunch.

Here were my options from which I ended up choosing ServerAvatar :

Laravel Forge : forge.laravel.com - this is right from the makers of Laravel ! Must be the #1 choice right? Maybe when they started but there are other players, who are solely focused on server infrastructure and provisioning that maybe it's worth checking others out too. Moreover, forge's plan starts at $12 a month for a single server and the business plan is at $39 a mo.

Ploi : ploi.io - Seems to be run by mainly one person from Netherlands, who contributes a lot to the Laravel project. They are even tightly integrated with Tenancy for Laravel - $199 SaaS boiler-plate code which is a multi-tenancy package for Laravel. Ploi's basic plans are at $10 a month and upto $36 a month for all features. They are actively on discord to lend support by means of chat.

MezoHub : mezohub.com - This is a new kid in the block from Bangalore, which restricts the user from viewing the control panel before connecting to a server provider like DigitalOcean, Linode or AWS, which I was reluctant to do in the first place. Their pricing slabs are $5 and $15 a month.

ServerAvatar : serveravatar.com - Surat-based company - but an amazing UI for their control panel - so much that I wouldn't be surprised if more effort was spent on the UI than on the code for provisioning servers and setting up the applications. They have a single pricing option which is at $6 a month which goes well for starting up. But instead of keeping a higher tier for their higher-end customers, they have a $100+/month support plan which I think is far more important and useful than having to upgrade to a plan that has more features. If any of the Laravel projects picks up big time, then the $100+ / mo customer support plan would be of immense use.