How to add columns to the existing table in Laravel through migration

Well, we all know how Laravel Migration feature help us to maintain database related to our modules and packages.

Before going to start I want to say what Laravel Migration is, Laravel migration is a way that allows you to create a table in your database by just running php artisan:migrate in your command line.If you need more information regarding migration you can visit here https://laravel.com/docs/7.x/migrations.But the issue arises when you want to add some more columns in your existing table through migration.

Add single column through migration

So, let’s see what to do if you just want to add a single column in your existing table through migration. Suppose you already have a users table in which you have been migrated and you want to add a single column in it.Just run the below command.

php artisan make:migration add_profile_to_users

It will create a file 2020_05_30_082632_add_profile_to_users.php under database/migration go open the file you can find code something like below

<?php

use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Schema;
use Illuminate\Database\Schema\Blueprint;
use Illuminate\Database\Migrations\Migration;

class AddProfileToUsers extends Migration
{
    /**
     * Run the migrations.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function up()
    {
        Schema::table('users', function (Blueprint $table) {
            $table->string('proflie')->nullable;
        });
    }

    /**
     * Reverse the migrations.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function down()
    {
        Schema::table('users', function (Blueprint $table) {
            $table->dropColumn(['profile']);
        });
    }
}

Note: Somehow if you didn’t find any column name after the migration command you can add it by your own.

Add multiple columns through migration

If you want to add more than one column in your existing table in Laravel through migration then just run the below command

php artisan make:migration add_multiple_column_to_users

It will create a file 2020_05_30_082633_add_multiple_column_to_users.php under database/migration go open the file you can find code with no column you can as much as the column you want to add in the existing table.

<?php

use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Schema;
use Illuminate\Database\Schema\Blueprint;
use Illuminate\Database\Migrations\Migration;

class AddMultipleColumnToUsers extends Migration
{
    /**
     * Run the migrations.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function up()
    {
        Schema::table('users', function (Blueprint $table) {
            $table->string('phone')->nullable;
            $table->string('image')->nullable;
        });
    }

    /**
     * Reverse the migrations.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function down()
    {
        Schema::table('users', function (Blueprint $table) {
            $table->dropColumn(['phone','image']);
        });
    }
}

Available Column Types

The schema builder contains a variety of column types that you may specify when building your tables:

I hope the above blog post help you to solve your issue, if your issue still doesn’t resolve ping us, we are here to help you.You can also read our other post on laravel here https://blog.codehunger.in/category/laravel/