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Requirements

Herd requires Windows 10 or higher and needs administrator privileges during the setup process.

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Installation

You can download the latest version of Herd here.

After downloading the installer, you need to run it with admin permissions so that the installer can add the HerdHelper service that is responsible for updating your hosts file and map directories and linked sites to .test domains.

After the installation process is complete, you have a fully-functioning PHP and Laravel development environment. This means you can invoke the herd, php, laravel, and composer binaries from your terminal:

herd --version
php --version
laravel --version
composer --version
node --version

Herd does not alter any services on your system, and if it’s not for you, you can easily switch back to your previous setup.

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Performance

Sometimes the Windows Defender likes to scan Herd folders and decreases your Herd performance. You can create an exclude rule for the Herd config folder for Windows Defender by adding the path %USERPROFILE%\.config\herd to it and mitigate this issue.