POST Body Empty in iOS Simulator — `$_POST` / `$request->all()` Returns Empty Array

[WojciechRhdt]

What were you trying to do?

When submitting an HTML form via POST with Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded inside the NativePHP iOS WebView (WKWebView), PHP's $_POST superglobal is always empty. Laravel's $request->all() returns [] even though the request method and content type header are correct.

Environment

NativePHP Mobile	3.2.2
Laravel	12.x
PHP	8.3.30
Platform	iOS Simulator (macOS)

What happened?

$request->all() returns an empty array despite the correct method and content type:

{
  "all": [],
  "method": "POST",
  "content_type": "application/x-www-form-urlencoded"
}

How to reproduce the bug

1. Create a standard HTML form with method="POST":

<form method="POST" action="/submit">
    <input type="hidden" name="_token" value="...">
    <input type="text" name="name" value="John">
    <input type="password" name="password" value="secret123">
    <button type="submit">Submit</button>
</form>

2. In the receiving controller, inspect the request:

public function submit(Request $request)
{
    Log::debug('request', [
        'all'          => $request->all(),
        'method'       => $request->method(),
        'content_type' => $request->header('Content-Type'),
    ]);
}

3. Fill out the form in the iOS Simulator and submit it.

Expected Behavior

$request->all() returns the submitted field values:

{
  "name": "John",
  "password": "secret123"
}

Debug Output

INFO NativePHP Mobile.

+--------------------+--------+
| Package Version | 3.2.2 |
| PHP Version (Host) | 8.3.30 |
| OS | Darwin |
| OS Version | 25.2.0 |
| Embedded PHP | 8.3 |
+--------------------+--------+

INFO Installed Plugins.

None

INFO Development Tools.

+----------------+------------------+
| Xcode | Xcode 26.4 |
| Android Studio | Not found |
| Gradle | Not found |
| Java | Not found |
| CocoaPods | CocoaPods 1.16.2 |
+----------------+------------------+

Which operating systems have you seen this occur on?

macOS

Which platforms were you trying to build for?

iOS (Simulator)

Notes

No response

[WojciechRhdt]

The error only occurs in persistent runtime, not in classic.

[GertTimmerman]

I have the same bug. I changed from Laravel Passport login to Laravel Sanctum because of issue #78 and now I ran into this issue. I also tried some quickfixes that are around, but they also not helps. For me it is also on Android.

[bbashy]

I had to use a middleware to populate the contents.

<?php

namespace App\Http\Middleware;

use Closure;
use Illuminate\Http\Request;
use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Response;

/**
 * NativePHP's iOS scheme handler forwards the request body but doesn't set
 * the Content-Length header, so PHP never auto-populates $_POST for
 * application/x-www-form-urlencoded requests. The raw body is still
 * readable via $request->getContent(); this middleware re-parses it into
 * the request input when Laravel's own parsing came up empty.
 */
class ParseNativePhpFormBody
{
    public function handle(Request $request, Closure $next): Response
    {
        if (! $request->isMethod('POST') && ! $request->isMethod('PUT') && ! $request->isMethod('PATCH')) {
            return $next($request);
        }

        // Only step in when Laravel parsed nothing but there's actually a body.
        if (count($request->all()) > 0) {
            return $next($request);
        }

        $raw = $request->getContent();

        if ($raw === '') {
            return $next($request);
        }

        $contentType = (string) $request->header('content-type', '');

        if (str_contains($contentType, 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded')) {
            parse_str($raw, $parsed);
            $request->merge($parsed);
        } elseif (str_contains($contentType, 'application/json')) {
            $parsed = json_decode($raw, true);
            if (is_array($parsed)) {
                $request->merge($parsed);
            }
        }

        return $next($request);
    }
}