Laravel 5.1 Unknown database type enum requested

It is a known issue as stated in Laravel 5.1 documentation.

Note: Renaming columns in a table with a enum column is not currently supported.

It happens when you have a enum column in your database table. Whether you are trying to rename another column, or change another column to nullable, this bug will appear. It's an issue with Doctrine\DBAL.

An easy fix for this is to just add this constructor method in your database migration file.

public function __construct()
{
    DB::getDoctrineConnection()->getDatabasePlatform()->registerDoctrineTypeMapping('enum', 'string');
}

This will map all the ENUM columns to VARCHAR(), and the column will accept any string.

This worked for me on Laravel 5.1 and Laravel 5.3. I hope this bug can be fixed soon.

Credit to @Gmatkowski's answer at https://stackoverflow.com/a/32860409/1193201

I get rid of this problem by creating a new Migration Class and making my migrations extending from it. Maybe there are multiple ways to make it more "standard" but this is just a very simple case which works perfectly for our team.

use Doctrine\DBAL\Types\{StringType, Type};
use Illuminate\Database\Migrations\Migration;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\{DB, Log};

/**
 * Class ExtendedMigration
 * Use it when the involved table(s) has enum type column(s)
 */
class ExtendedMigration extends Migration
{
    /**
     * ExtendedMigration constructor.
     * Handle Laravel Issue related with modifying tables with enum columns
     */
    public function __construct()
    {
        try {
            Type::hasType('enum') ?: Type::addType('enum', StringType::class);
            Type::hasType('timestamp') ?: Type::addType('timestamp', DateTimeType::class);
        } catch (\Exception $exception) {
            Log::info($exception->getMessage());
        }
    }
}

Then as explained before just extend your migration from it

class SampleMigration extends ExtendedMigration
{
    public function up()
    {
        Schema::create('invitations', function (Blueprint $table) {
            ...
            $table->enum('status', ['sent', 'consumed', 'expired'])->default('sent');
            ...
        });
    }

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

I had the same problem, I could solve it in Laravel 10.x in the following ways:

Option 1: Using native schema operations

You have to call Schema::useNativeSchemaOperationsIfPossible() method within the boot method of your App\Providers\AppServiceProvider class or within your migrations files to be able to use native schema operations.

References:

• https://github.com/laravel/framework/pull/45487
• https://github.com/laravel/framework/pull/45258

Option 2: Adding doctrine type mapping

Add this constructor method in your database migration file.

use Doctrine\DBAL\Types\StringType;
use Doctrine\DBAL\Types\Type;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\DB;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Schema;

....

public function __construct()
{
    if (!Type::hasType('enum')) {
        Type::addType('enum', StringType::class);
    }

    DB::getDoctrineConnection()->getDatabasePlatform()->registerDoctrineTypeMapping('enum', 'string');
}

Option 3: Using DB statements

use Illuminate\Support\Facades\DB;

...

public function up()
{
    DB::statement("ALTER TABLE `table_name` CHANGE `column_name` `column_name` ENUM('option1', 'option2', 'option2') DEFAULT 'option1';");
}

Reference

• https://42coders.com/changing-enum-column-in-laravel-migration

Laravel: 5.8, 6, 7, 8

use Doctrine\DBAL\Types\StringType;
use Doctrine\DBAL\Types\Type;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\DB;

    public function __construct()
    {
        if (! Type::hasType('enum')) {
            Type::addType('enum', StringType::class);
        }
        // For point types
        // DB::getDoctrineSchemaManager()->getDatabasePlatform()->registerDoctrineTypeMapping('point', 'string');
        DB::getDoctrineSchemaManager()->getDatabasePlatform()->registerDoctrineTypeMapping('enum', 'string');
    }

You should not use enum at all. Even with laravel 5.8, problem is not resolved.

Thank's to everyone who reminded that

The official Laravel 5.1 documentation states:

Note: Renaming columns in a table with a enum column is not currently supported.

Plus you will have the same problem when adding available options into enum column declaration.

It brings me to a conclusion that You should use enum with care. or even You should not use enum at all.

I cannot vote up any answer that offer to replace enum with string. NO, you need to create a lookup table and replace enum with unsignedInteger as a foreign key.

It is a lot of work and you'll be upset doing it without previous unit-test coverage, but this is a right solution.

You may be even fired for doing this correctly, because it is taking too long, but, don't worry, you'll find a better job. :)

Here is an example of how difficult would it be adding available options into enum column declaration

say you have this:

Schema::create('blogs', function (Blueprint $table) {
    $table->enum('type', [BlogType::KEY_PAYMENTS]);
    $table->index(['type', 'created_at']);
...

and you need to make more types available

public function up(): void
{
    Schema::table('blogs', function (Blueprint $table) {
        $table->dropIndex(['type', 'created_at']);
        $table->enum('type_tmp', [
            BlogType::KEY_PAYMENTS,
            BlogType::KEY_CATS,
            BlogType::KEY_DOGS,
        ])->after('type');
    });

    DB::statement('update `blogs` as te set te.`type_tmp` = te.`type` ');

    Schema::table('blogs', function (Blueprint $table) {
        $table->dropColumn('type');
    });

    Schema::table('blogs', function (Blueprint $table) {
        $table->enum('type', [
            BlogType::KEY_PAYMENTS,
            BlogType::KEY_CATS,
            BlogType::KEY_DOGS,
        ])->after('type_tmp');
    });

    DB::statement('update `blogs` as te set te.`type` = te.`type_tmp` ');

    Schema::table('blogs', function (Blueprint $table) {
        $table->dropColumn('type_tmp');
        $table->index(['type', 'created_at']);
    });
}

You can either use the above suggestions or can add the below code to your migration file...

public function up()
    {
DB::connection()->getDoctrineSchemaManager()->getDatabasePlatform()->registerDoctrineTypeMapping('enum', 'string');

Schema::table('<YOUR_TABLE>', function (Blueprint $table) {
//YOUR CHANGES HERE
}    
    }

A real dirty solution, that gets the job done none the less would be to

update Doctrine/DBAL/Schema/MySqlSchemaManager.php 

by ading these lines just above line 113

$this->_platform->registerDoctrineTypeMapping('enum', 'string');
$type = $this->_platform->getDoctrineTypeMapping($dbType);

Beware that updating vendor files directly is not advisable because in the event the vonder chooses to update the plugin, you changes could be overwritten

I think the easiest way to fix this issue is adding a mapping type to doctrine.yaml if applicable so that enum will be treated as string.

doctrine:
    dbal:
        #other configuration
        mapping_types:
            enum: string

If you ever run into the error below on a Doctrine with Laminas setup. Find the source of the enum column because my source code contains nothing like it.

Unknown database type enum requested

It was a table schema that phpMyAdmin created in the database that Doctrine wanted to match/sync with my schema definition. And it couldn’t find the enum column contained in the phpMyAdmin schema.

I solved it by moving the pma_ tables to a different database.