Common PHP Test Smells That Undermine Code Quality and How to Fix Them

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A technical analysis highlights recurring test quality issues in PHP projects that can cause production failures even when test suites appear to pass. Problems identified include tests with too many unrelated assertions, hidden data dependencies known as the 'Mystery Guest' smell, and overly strict assertions that fail on harmless code changes. These patterns appear across popular PHP frameworks including PHPUnit, Pest, Laravel, and Symfony. Recommended fixes include splitting tests into single-responsibility units, using factories to create explicit test data, and asserting only the behavior that genuinely matters to the business logic.

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