Check for a specific relation in Laravel Many-To.Many relationship

Question

I have an application with a User model and a Group model as well as a Many-To-Many relationship defined between both models.

I now would like to check if a user is member of a specific group.

I know that this works

$u = User::find(1);
$g = $u->groups->where('name', 'Administrators')->get();

Then I have the group in $g if the user belongs to it. But I am not interested in the group, I just would like to know if the user belongs to it. Of course, I could work with it, but is seems not to be the best solution. Another approach would be the following:

$u = User::find(1);
$g = $u->groups->where('name', 'Administrators')->count();

This seems a little bit more elegant to me. $g == 0 if the user is not a member, $g == 1 if the user is. But my feeling is that Laravel offers a better solution... There are so many shortcuts in Laravel. I'd be surpried if there wasn't another method tailored for this specific need. But which? (There are so many cases, where there is a belongsTo, has, in or similar method, which would be also useful here.)

I already checked the following links in the Laravel documentation, but they do not mention this use case. Is it so special? Or am I just looking in a completely wrong direction?

https://laravel.com/docs/10.x/eloquent-relationships#querying-relationship-existence

and

https://laravel.com/docs/10.x/eloquent-relationships#many-to-many

Majva · Accepted Answer · 2024-08-24 07:29:42Z

2

There are several ways to check if a relation exists.

You can use the method exists()

if ($user->posts()->exists()) {
  // The user has associated articles ("posts" relationship)
}

2.Use count

if (count($model->relation)){
   // exists
 }

Use count on relation

if($model->relation()->count()){
  //
}

Also, You use the where condition on all relations to determine specific condition

answered Aug 24, 2024 at 7:29

Majva

1501 silver badge10 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

2 Comments

TomS Over a year ago

In my case it is not enough that any relation exists (i.e. that the user belongs to any group), I need the confirmation that a user belongs to a specific group (e. g. "Administrators")

Majva Over a year ago

I mentioned that you can use where condition. $user->posts()->where(condition)->exists()

Kevin Bui · Accepted Answer · 2024-08-24 09:44:40Z

1

@Majva's answer is nearly complete, you can do one of the followings:

return $user->groups()->where('name', 'Administrators')->exists();

// Or
return $user->groups()->where('name', 'Administrators')->count();

// Or
return $user->groups->contains('name', 'Administrators');

You might want to check this section of the documentation.

answered Aug 24, 2024 at 9:44

Kevin Bui

3,0551 gold badge17 silver badges18 bronze badges

Comments

M. Rivaldi Anwar Putra · Accepted Answer · 2024-08-24 08:09:23Z

1

you can use contains, here for the documentation https://laravel.com/docs/11.x/collections#method-contains.

as for your case you can check it like :

$u = User::find(1);
$g = $u->groups->contains('name', 'Administrators');

it'll return true or false, so you can check it like this

if($g){
    // your logic here
}

answered Aug 24, 2024 at 8:09

M. Rivaldi Anwar Putra

17712 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Check for a specific relation in Laravel Many-To.Many relationship

3 Answers 3

2 Comments

Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

3 Answers 3

2 Comments

Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related