Eloquent ORM Setup for Laravel Web Application

Eloquent ORM Setup for Laravel Web Application

Eloquent — Active Record implementation over PDO supporting PostgreSQL, MySQL, SQLite, and SQL Server. In Laravel 10/11 it's already included, but correct configuration is more than just .env. We cover the full path: from connection config to advanced techniques.

Connection Configuration

config/database.php — only change critical parameters, rest from .env:

'pgsql' => [
    'driver'   => 'pgsql',
    'url'      => env('DATABASE_URL'),
    'host'     => env('DB_HOST', '127.0.0.1'),
    'port'     => env('DB_PORT', '5432'),
    'database' => env('DB_DATABASE', 'forge'),
    'username' => env('DB_USERNAME', 'forge'),
    'password' => env('DB_PASSWORD', ''),
    'charset'  => 'utf8',
    'prefix'   => '',
    'search_path' => 'public',
    'sslmode'  => env('DB_SSLMODE', 'prefer'),
]

For production behind reverse proxy, set persistent connections to false — they conflict with pgBouncer.

Model

<?php
namespace App\Models;

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Casts\Attribute;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\SoftDeletes;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Builder;

class Product extends Model
{
    use SoftDeletes;

    protected $table = 'products';
    protected $fillable = ['title', 'slug', 'price', 'status', 'category_id'];
    protected $casts = [
        'price'      => 'decimal:2',
        'meta'       => 'array',
        'published_at' => 'datetime',
    ];

    public function scopePublished(Builder $query): Builder
    {
        return $query->where('status', 'published');
    }

    public function category(): BelongsTo
    {
        return $this->belongsTo(Category::class);
    }

    public function tags(): BelongsToMany
    {
        return $this->belongsToMany(Tag::class, 'product_tags')
                    ->withTimestamps();
    }
}

Migrations

<?php
use Illuminate\Database\Migrations\Migration;
use Illuminate\Database\Schema\Blueprint;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Schema;

return new class extends Migration {
    public function up(): void
    {
        Schema::create('products', function (Blueprint $table) {
            $table->id();
            $table->string('title', 500);
            $table->string('slug', 520)->unique();
            $table->foreignId('category_id')->constrained()->restrictOnDelete();
            $table->decimal('price', 12, 2);
            $table->string('status', 20)->default('draft');
            $table->timestamps();
            $table->index(['status', 'created_at']);
        });
    }
};

Eager Loading

$products = Product::query()
    ->published()
    ->with(['category', 'tags'])
    ->orderBy('created_at', 'desc')
    ->paginate(24);

Use preventLazyLoading() in local development to catch N+1 issues:

if (app()->isLocal()) {
    Model::preventLazyLoading();
}

Transactions

DB::transaction(function () use ($orderId, $items) {
    $order = Order::findOrFail($orderId);
    $order->update(['status' => 'processing']);

    foreach ($items as $item) {
        Product::find($item['product_id'])
            ->decrement('stock', $item['quantity']);
    }
});

Timeline

Setup Eloquent for new Laravel project: 1 day. Audit and refactor existing project with N+1 problems: 1–2 days.