How to Create factory in Laravel 9?

Do you want to use factory in Laravel application?

This step-by-step tutorial helps you learn how to create Factory and insert dummy records in the table in Laravel application with the help of Factory.

To see an example of how to write a factory we will create a contact table and create a factory to insert some dummy records in the contacts table.

Why you should use Factory in Laravel

When testing your application or seeding your database, you may need to insert a few records into your database. Instead of manually specifying the value of each column, Laravel allows you to define a set of default attributes for each of your Eloquent models using model factories.

In this guide, I will tell you how to use a factory in the Laravel 9 application using Eloquent Factories.

Generate a Model & Run Migration

php artisan make:model Contact -m

database/migrations/create_contacts_table.php

<?php

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

return new class extends Migration
{
    /**
     * Run the migrations.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function up()
    {
        Schema::create('contacts', function (Blueprint $table) {
            $table->id();
            $table->string('name');
            $table->string('phone');
            $table->string('email');
            $table->text('subject');
            $table->text('message');
            $table->timestamps();
        });
    }

    /**
     * Reverse the migrations.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function down()
    {
        Schema::dropIfExists('contacts');
    }
};

Next, you can migrate table properties in the database with the artisan migrate command:

php artisan migrate

app/Models/Contact.php:

<?php

namespace App\Models;

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Factories\HasFactory;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;

class Contact extends Model
{
    use HasFactory;
}

Defining Model Factories – Generating Factories

php artisan make:factory ContactFactory

The new factory class will be placed in your <strong>database/factories</strong> directory.

database\factories\ContactFactory.php

<?php

namespace Database\Factories;

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Factories\Factory;

/**
 * @extends \Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Factories\Factory<\App\Models\Contact>
 */
class ContactFactory extends Factory
{
    /**
     * Define the model's default state.
     *
     * @return array<string, mixed>
     */
    public function definition()
    {
        return [
            'name'    => fake()->name(),
            'phone'   => fake()->phoneNumber(),
            'email'   => fake()->unique()->safeEmail(),
            'subject' => fake()->paragraph(),
            'message' => fake()->paragraph(),
        ];
    }
}

Define Factory in Database Seeder Trait

database\seeders\DatabaseSeeder.php

<?php

namespace Database\Seeders;

// use Illuminate\Database\Console\Seeds\WithoutModelEvents;
use Illuminate\Database\Seeder;

class DatabaseSeeder extends Seeder
{
    /**
     * Seed the application's database.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function run()
    {

         \App\Models\Contact::factory(10)->create();

    }
}

Run your Seeder File

php artisan db:seed

Output:-

I hope that this article helped you learn to how to use Factory in Laravel 9. You may also want to check out our guide on How to Use Laravel Macro With Example in the Laravel application.

Read also:- Laravel Repository Design Pattern.