Column Types Reference

Type Mapping

The schema builder maps 37 generic column types to database-specific SQL types.

Generic Type	SQLite	MySQL	PostgreSQL
`ColTypeIncrements`	INTEGER	INT UNSIGNED AUTO_INCREMENT	SERIAL
`ColTypeBigIncrements`	INTEGER	BIGINT UNSIGNED AUTO_INCREMENT	BIGSERIAL
`ColTypeTinyInt`	INTEGER	TINYINT	SMALLINT
`ColTypeSmallInt`	INTEGER	SMALLINT	SMALLINT
`ColTypeMediumInt`	INTEGER	MEDIUMINT	INTEGER
`ColTypeInteger`	INTEGER	INT	INTEGER
`ColTypeBigInt`	INTEGER	BIGINT	BIGINT
`ColTypeUnsignedInteger`	INTEGER	INT UNSIGNED	INTEGER
`ColTypeUnsignedBigInteger`	INTEGER	BIGINT UNSIGNED	BIGINT
`ColTypeString`	VARCHAR	VARCHAR	VARCHAR
`ColTypeChar`	CHAR	CHAR	CHAR
`ColTypeText`	TEXT	TEXT	TEXT
`ColTypeMediumText`	TEXT	MEDIUMTEXT	TEXT
`ColTypeLongText`	TEXT	LONGTEXT	TEXT
`ColTypeBoolean`	INTEGER	TINYINT(1)	BOOLEAN
`ColTypeDate`	DATE	DATE	DATE
`ColTypeDateTime`	DATETIME	DATETIME	TIMESTAMP
`ColTypeDateTimeTz`	DATETIME	DATETIME	TIMESTAMPTZ
`ColTypeTime`	TIME	TIME	TIME
`ColTypeTimestamp`	DATETIME	TIMESTAMP	TIMESTAMP
`ColTypeTimestampTz`	DATETIME	TIMESTAMP	TIMESTAMPTZ
`ColTypeDecimal`	numeric	DECIMAL	NUMERIC
`ColTypeDouble`	REAL	DOUBLE	DOUBLE PRECISION
`ColTypeFloat`	REAL	FLOAT	REAL
`ColTypeBinary`	BLOB	BLOB	BYTEA
`ColTypeUUID`	TEXT	CHAR(36)	UUID
`ColTypeULID`	TEXT	CHAR(26)	CHAR(26)
`ColTypeEnum`	TEXT	ENUM(‘a’,‘b’)	VARCHAR + CHECK
`ColTypeJson`	TEXT	JSON	JSONB

Modifier	SQLite	MySQL	PostgreSQL
`NOT NULL`	NOT NULL	NOT NULL	NOT NULL
`DEFAULT val`	DEFAULT val	DEFAULT val	DEFAULT val
`UNIQUE`	UNIQUE	UNIQUE	UNIQUE
`PRIMARY KEY`	PRIMARY KEY	PRIMARY KEY	PRIMARY KEY
`AUTO_INCREMENT`	AUTOINCREMENT	AUTO_INCREMENT	(SERIAL/BIGSERIAL)
`UNSIGNED`	—	UNSIGNED	—

Use BigIncrements("id") for primary keys in production — it supports up to 9 quintillion rows
Use Timestamps() for created_at/updated_at tracking
Use SoftDeletes() for soft deletion support
For enums in PostgreSQL, the builder uses VARCHAR with CHECK constraints
Always wrap string defaults in extra quotes: Default("'active'")