SpinApp vs Laravel Herd

Overview

Capability	SpinApp	Laravel Herd
Primary platform / target user	macOS desktop app; Docker Desktop/Colima required	macOS native Laravel/PHP dev environment
Core approach	Containerized local full-stack Laravel environment (“spins up Docker”)	Native dev control panel and local services
AI assistant integration	Bundled MCP server per project + “Setup AI” workflow	Does not present built-in MCP/A.I. assistant container context
Queue dashboard	Included “Queue dashboard” (replaces Horizon per page claims)	Not positioned as an AI-enabled Horizon/queue dashboard replacement
Windows support	Not supported at the moment (per customer-provided limitation)	Not positioned as Windows-focused in official macOS messaging

Capability	SpinApp	Laravel Herd
Docker stack automation (DB/queue/cache/frontend)	Yes	No
No hand-written docker-compose.yml requirement	Included (SpinApp “Full stack, zero Compose”)	Does not target “zero Compose” for Docker stacks
Built-in MCP server per project	Included	Does not support
“Setup AI” rules/configuration for MCP clients (Cursor/Claude)	Included	Does not support
Exec-like command execution inside the right containers (artisan/composer/npm)	Included	Does not support
SQL execution against provisioned DB	Included	Not positioned as container-context SQL tooling
Container logs + Laravel log visibility	Included	Not positioned as container-context AI logs tool
Environment lifecycle control (start/stop/status)	Included	Partial
Built-in queue visibility/controls	Included “Queue dashboard”	Not positioned as a Horizon replacement queue dashboard
Queue driver breadth (Redis/database/RabbitMQ claimed by SpinApp)	Supports	N/A
DB provisioning (PostgreSQL/MySQL/MariaDB/SQLite; credentials to .env)	Included	Not positioned as multi-engine DB provisioning via Docker automation
Hostname convenience (/etc/hosts -> my-app.local)	Included	Not positioned as a cross-container hostname provisioning workflow
Share via Cloudflare tunnel	Supports	Not positioned
SQL profiling / query logging	Included (“SPX & SQL profiling”)	Not positioned

Choose SpinApp if you want an AI-assistant-ready Laravel local environment where commands run inside the correct Docker containers, including DB/queue/cache provisioning and an included queue dashboard.
Choose Laravel Herd if you prefer a fast native macOS Laravel/PHP control panel for local services and are not specifically optimizing for AI assistant MCP container context.