The Laravel Podcast The Architecture Behind Laravel Cloud with Chris Fidao
Nov 3, 2025
Chris Fidao, Team Lead of Laravel’s Infrastructure Cloud Team, shares his fascinating journey from a Laravel beginner to a cloud infrastructure expert. He discusses why Laravel Cloud opted for Kubernetes instead of serverless architecture and how that choice impacts performance and costs. Chris reveals insights into managing an engineering team, emphasizing cost-conscious decision-making and innovative tools like Slack bots for team visibility. He also reflects on maintaining work-life balance by stepping back from social media for better mental health.
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From Content Creator To Cloud Engineer
- Chris Fidao joined Laravel Cloud after years of creating server-focused content and tools for PHP developers.
- Taylor and others recruited him because his Service For Hackers work made him known as the "server guy."
Why Kubernetes Over Serverless
- The team rejected a Lambda-style serverless approach because it didn't fit Laravel's PHP workload patterns and cost model.
- They chose Kubernetes to manage many workloads reliably and leverage its large ecosystem and orchestration features.
Automate Complex Deploys With Operators
- Use Kubernetes operators to programmatically orchestrate complex deployment steps like running migrations during deploys.
- Prefer code-driven operators over pure YAML when you need interactive orchestration and rollback capabilities.