Running and rolling back migrations in Laravel

Introduction

Migrations help you change your database step-by-step. Running migrations applies changes. Rolling back undoes them if needed.

When you add a new table or column to your database

When you fix a mistake in a previous database change

When you want to reset your database to a previous state during development

When you share your database changes with your team

When testing database changes before going live

Syntax

Laravel

php artisan migrate
php artisan migrate:rollback

php artisan migrate runs all new migrations.

php artisan migrate:rollback undoes the last batch of migrations.

Examples

This command runs all migrations that have not been run yet.

Laravel

php artisan migrate

This command rolls back the last batch of migrations that were run.

Laravel

php artisan migrate:rollback

This rolls back the last two migrations.

Laravel

php artisan migrate:rollback --step=2

This command deletes all tables and runs all migrations fresh.

Laravel

php artisan migrate:fresh

Sample Program

This migration creates a books table with id, title, author, and timestamp columns. Running php artisan migrate applies this change. Running php artisan migrate:rollback removes the books table.

Laravel

<?php

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

class CreateBooksTable extends Migration
{
    public function up()
    {
        Schema::create('books', function (Blueprint $table) {
            $table->id();
            $table->string('title');
            $table->string('author');
            $table->timestamps();
        });
    }

    public function down()
    {
        Schema::dropIfExists('books');
    }
}

// To run this migration, use:
// php artisan migrate

// To roll back this migration, use:
// php artisan migrate:rollback

Important Notes

Always back up your data before rolling back migrations in production.

Rolling back only affects the last batch of migrations run together.

You can use --step to roll back multiple migrations at once.

Summary

Running migrations applies new database changes.

Rolling back migrations undoes recent changes.

Use these commands to manage your database structure safely.