PhpStorm’s External Tools have been around for ages—perfect for running command-line formatters like Laravel Pint only when you decide.
Why ditch the auto-save watcher?
In short, a keyboard shortcut keeps intentional control over when Pint rewrites your code.
Below is a zero-overhead setup that maps Pint to your favorite shortcut (⌥ ⌘ L in this example). Note that, of course you can use any shortcut you like but I replaced reformat code shortcut with Pint as it made sense to me.
Prereqs: a Laravel project with Pint installed
composer require --dev laravel/pint
You’ll need PhpStorm 2023.2+ for built-in Pint support. Read more
Configure Laravel Pint in PhpStorm
As this article is not about how to configure I suggest you to read this article from PhpStorm Docs
Create the external tool
Preferences → Tools → External Tools →
| Setting | Value |
|---|---|
| Name | Laravel Pint |
| Program | $ProjectFileDir$/vendor/bin/pint |
| Arguments | $FileRelativePath$ |
| Working directory | $ProjectFileDir$ |
| Advanced options | Uncheck Open console for tool output (optional – I leave it off because the pop-up gets annoying) |
Bind it to a keyboard shortcut
Preferences → Keymap
- Expand External Tools → Laravel Pint.
- Right-click → Add Keyboard Shortcut.
- Press ⌥ ⌘ L (or any combo).
- If PhpStorm asks to remove the binding from Reformat Code, choose Remove—or pick a different shortcut if you’d rather keep the built-in formatter separate.
Happy (intentional) formatting! 🎉
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