Encountering a 404 Not Found error on all routes except the homepage (‘/’) is a common issue in Laravel due to which developers can become stuck, especially when setting up a new project or environment. This post is aimed at helping Laravel developers troubleshoot and fix this issue, detailing the potential causes and providing step-by-step solutions.

Solution 1: Check Route Definitions

Ensuring that routes are defined correctly in the web.php or api.php file is essential.

Go to the routes folder of your Laravel application.

Open web.php or api.php, depending on which type of routes are returning 404 errors.
Review the routes and confirm they are defined correctly based on Laravel’s documentation.

Example:

// Example of a standard route definition in web.php
Route::get('/your-route', function () {
    return 'Route is working!';
});

Note: Routes should be defined clearly and without any typos. This solution requires no specific code changes if routes are already defined correctly.

Solution 2: Clear Route Cache

Caching routes can sometimes cause issues when new routes are added or existing routes are modified. Clearing the route cache can solve this.

Open the terminal and navigate to the root directory of your Laravel application.

Run the following command to clear the route cache:
php artisan route:clear

Note: Clearing the route cache will not affect your application’s performance in a development environment. However, in a production environment, you should only clear the cache when you have made changes to the routes.

Solution 3: Enable .htaccess and URL Rewriting

Incorrect Apache configuration or a missing .htaccess file might prevent URL rewriting, leading to 404 errors for all routes except the root.

1. Ensure that the .htaccess file is present in your Laravel project’s public directory.

2. If using Apache, make sure that the rewrite module is enabled. Run a2enmod rewrite in the terminal.

3. Check the .htaccess file for correct settings. The default Laravel .htaccess should contain:

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
    RewriteEngine On
    RewriteRule ^(.*)$ public/$1 [L]
</IfModule>

4. In your server’s configuration file, ensure that the AllowOverride directive for your site’s directory is set to All.

Note: Failure to enable URL rewriting can lead to this issue. Apache servers need the mod_rewrite module and proper .htaccess configuration to handle Laravel routing.

Solution 4: Set Correct Directory Permissions

Improper directory permissions can also lead to route errors. The storage and bootstrap/cache directories should be writable by the web server.

Change permissions of the storage and bootstrap/cache directories by running the following command from the root of your Laravel project:

sudo chmod -R 775 storage bootstrap/cache

Note: This ensures that Laravel has the necessary permissions to generate and store the cache and log files. Setting the correct permissions is crucial for Laravel to run smoothly.

Solution 5: Check Server Configuration

Server configuration settings can also be the culprit for routing issues. Make sure that your server is configured to serve the public directory of your Laravel project.

Verify the server configuration file (Apache: 000-default.conf, Nginx: nginx.conf) and ensure that the root or document root is pointing to the public directory of your Laravel project.

Note: Incorrect server configuration can route all traffic to the base ‘/’ route, ignoring other routes defined in the web application.