title: Full Testing Guide description: Unit, feature, mock, and end-to-end testing with Testbench.

Full Testing Guide

Guardrails is tested with Pest + Orchestra Testbench using an in-memory sqlite database. This guide explains how to run the suite and how to test your app-specific flows.

Running the Suite

composer update
./vendor/bin/pest --coverage

What’s Covered

• Unit tests: builder, signing policy, auth helper.
• Feature tests: route registration, capture via trait, approve via API, controller interceptor.
• Events: faked and asserted for capture and completion.

Structure

• Tests use a stub users provider model and a posts table.
• Guard is set to web for simplicity in tests; the package uses your configured guard.

Writing Your App Tests

1. Use in-memory sqlite or test DB; load Guardrails migrations and your own tables.
2. Create a model with the Guardrail trait and declare guarded attributes.
3. actingAs($user, config('guardrails.auth.guard')) to test capture/approve flows.
4. Event testing: Event::fake([...]) and Event::assertDispatched(...).

CI

GitHub Actions workflow run-tests.yml runs the suite across PHP 8.1–8.3 and uploads coverage to Codecov.

Related Guides

• Model Guarding Guide — Set up fixtures that mirror your production models.
• Controller Interception Guide — Cover interceptor flows in feature tests.
• Advanced Flows — Know what behaviours to assert for dynamic policies.
• Common Patterns — Use sample flows as starting points for new specs.