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PHP New Added 29 September 2026

Composer: Your lock file does not contain a compatible set of packages

composer install found that the versions pinned in composer.lock cannot run here, almost always because of the PHP version or a missing extension, not a problem with the lock file itself. The lock was generated on a machine with a newer PHP or with ext-intl or ext-gd installed, and the server or CI image does not match. Running composer update on the server just hides the mismatch.

Quick fix

Read the commands before running them. Anything that restarts a service, deletes data or changes permissions should be tried on a non-production system first.

Quick fix
# Which requirement fails? The lines below the error say, e.g. php >=8.3
composer check-platform-reqs --lock

# Compare runtimes
php -v
php -m | grep -i -E 'intl|gd|zip|bcmath'

# Fix 1: install the missing extension or the right PHP on the server
# sudo apt install php8.3-intl

# Fix 2: pin the platform so the lock matches production, then re-lock
composer config platform.php 8.2.20
composer update --lock

# Commit composer.json and composer.lock together
git add composer.json composer.lock

How to diagnose PHP errors

PHP errors are dominated by per-request resource limits (memory_limit, max_execution_time) and by autoloading. Class-not-found errors are almost never missing code. They are a namespace that does not match the PSR-4 mapping, or a stale Composer autoload map. Laravel adds a caching layer that produces genuinely confusing errors when configuration is cached with the wrong environment.

If the quick fix above does not resolve it, work through these steps. They apply to this whole class of error, not just to this one message, which is usually what saves the time.

  1. Read the real limits from the running process, not from a config file: php -i | grep -E 'memory_limit|max_execution_time'. CLI and FPM have separate configurations.
  2. Regenerate the autoload map with composer dump-autoload -o before investigating a class-not-found error any further.
  3. For Laravel, clear cached config and routes with php artisan optimize:clear. A config cache built in the wrong environment causes errors that survive every code change.
  4. Enable full error display in development (display_errors=On, error_reporting=E_ALL). The default production settings hide the cause.
  5. For PDO connection refusals, test the same credentials with the database's own CLI client to separate PHP configuration from database access.

Tools worth reaching for

  • php -i
  • composer dump-autoload -o
  • php artisan optimize:clear
  • Xdebug
  • tail -f storage/logs/laravel.log

Authoritative references

Primary documentation for this error, worth reading before applying any fix in production.

getcomposer.org getcomposer.org

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