Database migrations

Migrations are like version control for your database, letting teams define and share schema definitions. The Laravel Schema facade provides database-agnostic creation and manipulation of tables and columns across all supported database systems. Generate migrations with the make:migration Artisan command; files land in database/migrations, and each filename contains a timestamp determining execution order. Laravel attempts to guess the table name and creation intent from the migration name, pre-filling the file when successful; otherwise specify the table manually. Use --path for a custom output path relative to the base path, and customize stubs via stub publishing. To slim an accumulating database/migrations directory, squash migrations into a single SQL file with schema:dump; add --prune to also prune all existing migrations. Scope: Laravel. Reviewed October 4, 2026.