- Introduction
- Creating & Dropping Tables
- Adding Columns
- Renaming Columns
- Dropping Columns
- Checking Existence
- Adding Indexes
- Foreign Keys
- Dropping Indexes
- Dropping Timestamps & Soft Deletes
- Storage Engines
The Laravel Schema
class provides a database agnostic way of manipulating tables. It works well with all of the databases supported by Laravel, and has a unified API across all of these systems.
To create a new database table, the Schema::create
method is used:
Schema::create('users', function($table)
{
$table->increments('id');
});
The first argument passed to the create
method is the name of the table, and the second is a Closure
which will receive a Blueprint
object which may be used to define the new table.
To rename an existing database table, the rename
method may be used:
Schema::rename($from, $to);
To specify which connection the schema operation should take place on, use the Schema::connection
method:
Schema::connection('foo')->create('users', function($table)
{
$table->increments('id');
});
To drop a table, you may use the Schema::drop
method:
Schema::drop('users');
Schema::dropIfExists('users');
To update an existing table, we will use the Schema::table
method:
Schema::table('users', function($table)
{
$table->string('email');
});
The table builder contains a variety of column types that you may use when building your tables:
Command | Description |
---|---|
$table->bigIncrements('id'); |
Incrementing ID using a "big integer" equivalent. |
$table->bigInteger('votes'); |
BIGINT equivalent to the table |
$table->binary('data'); |
BLOB equivalent to the table |
$table->boolean('confirmed'); |
BOOLEAN equivalent to the table |
$table->char('name', 4); |
CHAR equivalent with a length |
$table->date('created_at'); |
DATE equivalent to the table |
$table->dateTime('created_at'); |
DATETIME equivalent to the table |
$table->decimal('amount', 5, 2); |
DECIMAL equivalent with a precision and scale |
$table->double('column', 15, 8); |
DOUBLE equivalent with precision |
$table->enum('choices', array('foo', 'bar')); |
ENUM equivalent to the table |
$table->float('amount'); |
FLOAT equivalent to the table |
$table->increments('id'); |
Incrementing ID to the table (primary key). |
$table->integer('votes'); |
INTEGER equivalent to the table |
$table->longText('description'); |
LONGTEXT equivalent to the table |
$table->mediumInteger('numbers'); |
MEDIUMINT equivalent to the table |
$table->mediumText('description'); |
MEDIUMTEXT equivalent to the table |
$table->morphs('taggable'); |
Adds INTEGER taggable_id and STRING taggable_type |
$table->nullableTimestamps(); |
Same as timestamps() , except allows NULLs |
$table->smallInteger('votes'); |
SMALLINT equivalent to the table |
$table->tinyInteger('numbers'); |
TINYINT equivalent to the table |
$table->softDeletes(); |
Adds deleted_at column for soft deletes |
$table->string('email'); |
VARCHAR equivalent column |
$table->string('name', 100); |
VARCHAR equivalent with a length |
$table->text('description'); |
TEXT equivalent to the table |
$table->time('sunrise'); |
TIME equivalent to the table |
$table->timestamp('added_on'); |
TIMESTAMP equivalent to the table |
$table->timestamps(); |
Adds created_at and updated_at columns |
->nullable() |
Designate that the column allows NULL values |
->default($value) |
Declare a default value for a column |
->unsigned() |
Set INTEGER to UNSIGNED |
If you are using the MySQL database, you may use the after
method to specify the order of columns:
$table->string('name')->after('email');
To rename a column, you may use the renameColumn
method on the Schema builder. Before renaming a column, be sure to add the doctrine/dbal
dependency to your composer.json
file.
Schema::table('users', function($table)
{
$table->renameColumn('from', 'to');
});
Note: Renaming
enum
column types is not supported.
Schema::table('users', function($table)
{
$table->dropColumn('votes');
});
Schema::table('users', function($table)
{
$table->dropColumn(array('votes', 'avatar', 'location'));
});
You may easily check for the existence of a table or column using the hasTable
and hasColumn
methods:
if (Schema::hasTable('users'))
{
//
}
if (Schema::hasColumn('users', 'email'))
{
//
}
The schema builder supports several types of indexes. There are two ways to add them. First, you may fluently define them on a column definition, or you may add them separately:
$table->string('email')->unique();
Or, you may choose to add the indexes on separate lines. Below is a list of all available index types:
Command | Description |
---|---|
$table->primary('id'); |
Adding a primary key |
$table->primary(array('first', 'last')); |
Adding composite keys |
$table->unique('email'); |
Adding a unique index |
$table->index('state'); |
Adding a basic index |
Laravel also provides support for adding foreign key constraints to your tables:
$table->foreign('user_id')->references('id')->on('users');
In this example, we are stating that the user_id
column references the id
column on the users
table.
You may also specify options for the "on delete" and "on update" actions of the constraint:
$table->foreign('user_id')
->references('id')->on('users')
->onDelete('cascade');
To drop a foreign key, you may use the dropForeign
method. A similar naming convention is used for foreign keys as is used for other indexes:
$table->dropForeign('posts_user_id_foreign');
Note: When creating a foreign key that references an incrementing integer, remember to always make the foreign key column
unsigned
.
To drop an index you must specify the index's name. Laravel assigns a reasonable name to the indexes by default. Simply concatenate the table name, the names of the column in the index, and the index type. Here are some examples:
Command | Description |
---|---|
$table->dropPrimary('users_id_primary'); |
Dropping a primary key from the "users" table |
$table->dropUnique('users_email_unique'); |
Dropping a unique index from the "users" table |
$table->dropIndex('geo_state_index'); |
Dropping a basic index from the "geo" table |
To drop the timestamps
, nullableTimestamps
or softDeletes
column types, you may use the following methods:
Command | Description |
---|---|
$table->dropTimestamps(); |
Dropping the created_at and updated_at columns from the table |
$table->dropSoftDeletes(); |
Dropping deleted_at column from the table |
To set the storage engine for a table, set the engine
property on the schema builder:
Schema::create('users', function($table)
{
$table->engine = 'InnoDB';
$table->string('email');
});