Dynamic query allows us to start with a base query and extend it so that we properly filter our data. You probably already used and know what Laravel is and how to create a basic database query.

We’ll cut straight to the problem:

How do we dynamically apply query conditions in Laravel?

Let’s take a look at the following example that I consider quite easy and basic query on a Listing model that has title, description, price, images and date columns:

$title = "planet";
$listings = Listing::where(function($q) use ($title) {
    $q->where('title', 'like', $title .'%');
})->get();

This query will return all our documents for which the title has the form planet% (they start with planet word).

You already knew how to achieve this so let’s extend this to a condition based query generation. Follow bellow:

$title = 'planet;
$price_min = 10;
$price_max = 100;
$listings = Listing::select('title', 'description', 'price', 'images', 'date');

// we're only going to filter by title if it's available
if(isset($title) && !empty($title)) {
    $listings->where(function($q) use ($title) {
        $q->where('title', 'like', $title.'%');
    });
}

// but there's more
// what about the price?
if(is_numeric($price_min)) {
    $listings->where('price', '>=', $price_min);
}

We’ve now learned how to build a dynamic query and how to add conditions on the run.

So how do we view our results? 1 line:

$listings = $listings->latest()->get();

That’s it. Now go and build you great app!