Test performance

test-performance

When to use

Use this skill when:

• Tests are running too slowly (locally or in CI)
• Database setup/teardown is a bottleneck
• Parallel testing needs optimization
• Seeders need performance analysis
• CI pipeline test jobs need to be faster
• Investigating flaky tests caused by database state

Procedure: Analyze test performance

1. Measure baseline

Before optimizing, always measure:

# Count tests per suite
find tests/ app/Modules/*/Tests/ -name "*.php" | xargs grep -l "it(" | wc -l

# Count by suite type
grep -rh "it(" tests/Unit/ app/Modules/*/Tests/Unit/ --include="*.php" | wc -l
grep -rh "it(" tests/Component/ app/Modules/*/Tests/Component/ --include="*.php" | wc -l
grep -rh "it(" tests/Integration/ app/Modules/*/Tests/Integration/ --include="*.php" | wc -l

# Count migrations
ls database/migrations/*.php | wc -l

# Count seeders
find database/seeders database/seeder-data -name "*.php" -path "*/data/*" | wc -l

2. Identify bottlenecks

The typical test lifecycle is:

Process Start → Migrate → Seed → [Test → Rollback] × N → Process End
                 ↑ expensive (once per worker)

Check these areas in order of typical impact:

Area	What to check	Typical impact
Migration count	How many CREATE TABLE statements?	High if >20
Schema dump	Is database/schema/ used?	High if missing
Seeder INSERT method	Individual save() vs bulk insert?	Medium
Truncation	Per-seeder truncate vs centralized?	Low (but causes correctness issues)
Connection discovery	Dynamic getPdo() probing?	Low
Parallel worker setup	Does each worker re-migrate?	High

3. Optimization strategies (ordered by ROI)

A. Schema Dump (highest ROI)

Laravel's schema:dump consolidates all migrations into one SQL file. Instead of running N individual CREATE TABLE migrations, it loads one SQL dump.

php artisan schema:dump --database=api_database
# Generates database/schema/api_database-schema.sql

Savings: 58 migrations → 1 SQL load = ~10-25s per worker.

B. Template DB Cloning (high ROI for parallel tests)

Instead of each parallel worker running migrate+seed independently:

1. Prepare ONE template database (migrate + seed)
2. Clone template for each worker via mysqldump

# Prepare template
php artisan migrate:fresh --database=template_db
php artisan db:seed --database=template_db

# Clone per worker
mysqldump template_db | mysql worker_db_test_1

Savings: Eliminate per-worker migrate+seed entirely.

C. Skip Migrate+Seed Flag (high ROI for local dev)

Add a config flag to skip database setup when DB is already prepared:

// config/testing.php
'skip_migrate_seed' => EnvHelper::boolean('TESTING_SKIP_MIGRATE_SEED', false),

Developer workflow: make migrate-testing once, then make test-quick repeatedly.

D. Bulk Inserts in Seeders (medium ROI)

Replace individual $model->save() with bulk insert:

// Before: N INSERT statements
foreach ($data as $row) {
    $model = new MyModel($row);
    $model->save();
}

// After: 1 INSERT statement
MyModel::insert($data);
$models = MyModel::whereIn('id', $ids)->get();

E. Centralize Truncation (correctness fix)

Per-seeder truncation is redundant after migrate:fresh and causes:

• Non-deterministic ordering (lazy init triggers truncate)
• Ghost data bugs (locally passes, CI fails)

Make truncation configurable, default off:

// config/testing.php
'seed_truncate' => EnvHelper::boolean('DB_SEED_TRUNCATE', false),

F. Static Connection Discovery (cleanup)

Replace dynamic getPdo() probing with explicit config:

// config/testing.php
'connections_to_transact' => ['api_database', 'customer_database'],

4. CI-specific optimizations

• MariaDB tmpfs: Mount data dir on RAM disk for zero I/O latency
• Shared DB prep: One CI job prepares DB, test jobs clone from it
• Cache test DBs: Skip re-migration if migration files haven't changed
• Separate suites: Run no-DB tests (Unit) on cheaper runners

Related project docs

• agents/reference/docs/seeders.md — seeder conventions (if exists)

Output format

1. Optimized test configuration or seeder with timing comparison
2. Parallelization or caching improvements applied

Gotcha

• Don't use RefreshDatabase when DatabaseTransactions suffices — full refresh is 10x slower.
• The model forgets that parallel tests share the database — use unique identifiers in test data.
• Seeder optimization has the highest ROI — a 2s seeder running 100 times = 200s wasted.
• Don't add indexes to test databases just for test performance — the real fix is better test design.

Do NOT

• Do NOT use RefreshDatabase when DatabaseTransactions works — 10x slower.
• Do NOT run full test suite on every code change — use --filter.
• Do NOT add test-only indexes — fix test design instead.
• Do NOT disable parallel testing to "fix" flaky tests — fix the root cause.