A route is a way to define how your application responds to a specific HTTP request. Routes define the entry points of your application, determining which controllers and methods should handle the incoming requests. The routing system in Laravel allows you to define routes in a readable and expressive way.

Routes are typically defined in the routes/web.php file for web routes and routes/api.php for API routes, although you can create additional route files if needed. Here's a basic example of defining a route in Laravel:

Route::get('/example', 'ExampleController@index');

In this example:

• Route::get specifies that this route responds to HTTP GET requests.

• /example is the URI (Uniform Resource Identifier) or path for the route.

• 'ExampleController@index' indicates that the index method of the ExampleController class should handle the request.

You can define routes for various HTTP methods such as GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, etc. Laravel also provides a resourceful routing mechanism that allows you to define routes for CRUD operations in a concise manner.

Routes can also have parameters, allowing you to capture values from the URI and pass them to your controllers. For example:

Route::get('/users/{id}', 'UserController@show');

In this case, {id} is a parameter that will capture the value from the URI and pass it to the show method of the UserController.

Laravel's routing system is powerful and flexible, providing a convenient way to define how different URLs in your application should be handled.