README

What is Realm?

Realm adds multi-tenancy to your Laravel app with a single trait and a safety-first approach. It's designed for the 80% of SaaS apps that need row-level tenant isolation in a single database.

Column strategy only. Database-per-tenant and schema-per-tenant strategies are coming in v1.0.

What makes Realm different?

Fail-closed by default. If no tenant context is active, queries on tenant models return empty results — not all tenants' data. Data leaks should be impossible by default.
Clean naming. The Realm facade and Tenant model are separate classes with zero method overlap. No ambiguity.
One trait, one macro. Add BelongsToRealm to a model and $table->realm() to a migration. That's it.
Octane-ready. Context is automatically reset between requests. No manual setup required.

What Realm is NOT (yet)

Battle-tested. This is a new package. Use in production at your own risk and report bugs.
A replacement for stancl/tenancy. Stancl has years of production edge cases discovered and fixed. If you need database-per-tenant today, use stancl.

Requirements

PHP 8.2+
Laravel 11, 12, or 13

Installation

composer require mahdisphp/laravel-realm
php artisan realm:install

Quick Start

1. Add the trait to your model

use Realm\Traits\BelongsToRealm;

class Project extends Model
{
    use BelongsToRealm;
}

2. Add the column to your migration

Schema::create('projects', function (Blueprint $table) {
    $table->id();
    $table->realm();  // Adds realm_id + index
    $table->string('name');
    $table->timestamps();
});

3. Wrap your routes

// Tenant routes — realm context is resolved automatically
Route::realm(function () {
    Route::get('/dashboard', [DashboardController::class, 'index']);
    Route::resource('projects', ProjectController::class);
});

// Central routes — guaranteed no tenant context
Route::central(function () {
    Route::get('/', [MarketingController::class, 'index']);
});

4. That's it

// Inside a tenant route, queries are scoped automatically
Project::all();           // Only current tenant's projects
Project::create([...]);   // realm_id set automatically

// Outside tenant context (strict mode) — returns empty, not everything
Project::all();           // [] — fail-closed, logged warning

Key Concepts

The Facade vs The Model

// FACADE — context management (Realm)
Realm::current();                    // Get active Tenant model
Realm::id();                         // Get active tenant ID
Realm::key();                        // Get active tenant key
Realm::check();                      // True if tenant set & tenancy enabled
Realm::isTenancyDisabled();          // True inside withoutTenancy()
Realm::run('acme', fn() => ...);     // Execute in a tenant's context
Realm::withoutTenancy(fn() => ...);  // Disable all scoping
Realm::forget();                     // Clear active tenant (keep tenancy state)

// FACADE — secrets
Realm::setSecret('acme', 'key', 'value');
Realm::getSecret('acme', 'key');
Realm::deleteSecret('acme', 'key');

// MODEL — data operations (Tenant)
Tenant::create(['key' => 'acme', 'name' => 'Acme Corp']);
Tenant::where('active', true)->get();

Strict Mode (Default: ON)

When no tenant context is active:

Model queries return empty results (WHERE 0 = 1) and log a warning
Model creates throw NoActiveRealmException
Cache and storage fall back to global (unprefixed) space

Escape Hatches

// Bypass query scope for ONE query (cache/storage still scoped)
Project::withoutRealm()->get();

// Bypass ALL scoping (queries + cache + storage)
Realm::withoutTenancy(fn() => Project::all());

// Query a specific tenant
$acme = Tenant::where('key', 'acme')->first();
Project::forRealm($acme)->get();

Shared vs Tenant Models

Not every model needs tenant scoping:

// TENANT MODEL — scoped, has realm_id
class Project extends Model { use BelongsToRealm; }

// SHARED MODEL — no trait, no realm_id, available to all tenants
class Category extends Model { /* no BelongsToRealm */ }

// Relationships work across the boundary:
// $project->category works (Category is not scoped)

Cache / Queue / Storage Isolation

Cache Key Prefixing

When a tenant is active, all cache keys are automatically prefixed with realm:{tenant_key}:. No code changes needed.

// Inside tenant 'acme' context:
Cache::put('settings', $data);  // Actually stores as realm:acme:settings
Cache::get('settings');          // Reads from realm:acme:settings

// Inside withoutTenancy — reads/writes global keys
Realm::withoutTenancy(fn() => Cache::get('settings'));  // Reads 'settings' (global)

Queue Context Propagation

Add the RealmAwareJob trait to your jobs. It captures the tenant context at dispatch time and restores it when the job is processed.

use Realm\Traits\RealmAwareJob;
use Realm\Integrations\RealmQueueMiddleware;

class GenerateReport implements ShouldQueue
{
    use RealmAwareJob;

    public function middleware(): array
    {
        return $this->realmMiddleware();
    }

    public function handle(): void
    {
        // Realm context is automatically restored here
    }
}

In strict mode, dispatching without context throws NoActiveRealmException
If the tenant is deleted between dispatch and processing, the job is failed
If the tenant is deactivated, the job is released with a configurable delay

Storage Path Prefixing

All storage paths are automatically prefixed with tenants/{tenant_key}/:

// Inside tenant 'acme' context:
Storage::put('logo.png', $file);  // Stores at tenants/acme/logo.png
Storage::get('logo.png');          // Reads from tenants/acme/logo.png

Encrypted Secrets

Store sensitive per-tenant configuration (API keys, tokens) encrypted at rest:

// On the Tenant model
$tenant->setSecret('stripe_key', 'sk_live_...');
$tenant->getSecret('stripe_key');   // Returns decrypted value
$tenant->deleteSecret('stripe_key');

// Via the Facade
Realm::setSecret('acme', 'stripe_key', 'sk_live_...');
Realm::getSecret('acme', 'stripe_key');

Secrets are:

Encrypted via Laravel's Crypt facade
Hidden from toArray() / toJson() (never accidentally serialized)
Cascade-deleted when the tenant is deleted

Tenant User Relationships

The tenant_users pivot table links users to tenants with roles:

// Attach a user
$tenant->users()->attach($user, ['role' => 'owner']);

// Query users
$tenant->users;                              // All users for this tenant
$tenant->users()->wherePivot('role', 'owner')->first();

Per-Tenant Config Overrides

Store non-sensitive config overrides in the tenant's data JSON column:

$tenant = Tenant::create([
    'key' => 'acme',
    'name' => 'Acme Corp',
    'data' => [
        'config' => [
            'app.name' => 'Acme Dashboard',
            'mail.from.name' => 'Acme Support',
        ],
    ],
]);

// Inside Realm::run() or middleware, config() returns tenant-specific values
Realm::run($tenant, function () {
    config('app.name'); // 'Acme Dashboard'
});
// After run(), original config values are restored

API keys and secrets should use setSecret(), not config overrides.

Resolvers

Realm resolves the tenant from the incoming request using a pipeline of resolvers. The first match wins.

Resolver	Config	Example
`SubdomainResolver`	`realm.subdomain.domain`	`acme.myapp.com`
`HeaderResolver`	`realm.header.name`	`X-Realm: acme`
`PathResolver`	`realm.path.segment`	`myapp.com/acme/dashboard`
`DomainResolver`	—	`app.acmecorp.com` (full custom domain)
`QueryResolver`	`realm.query.parameter`	`?realm=acme`
`SessionResolver`	`realm.session.key`	Session-based switching
`AuthResolver`	—	Resolves from authenticated user's tenant

Configure active resolvers in config/realm.php:

'resolvers' => [
    SubdomainResolver::class,
    HeaderResolver::class,
    // Add more as needed
],

Commands

php artisan realm:create acme "Acme Corp"              # Create a tenant
php artisan realm:delete acme                           # Delete (with confirmation)
php artisan realm:delete acme --force                   # Delete without confirmation
php artisan realm:list                                  # List all tenants
php artisan realm:check                                 # Diagnostic health check
php artisan realm:check --realm=acme                    # Inspect specific tenant
php artisan realm:test                                  # Verify isolation works
php artisan realm:exec acme "cache:clear"               # Run command as tenant
php artisan realm:run-for-each "cache:clear"            # Run command for all tenants
php artisan realm:run-for-each "reports:generate" --only=acme --only=globex

Testing

use Realm\Testing\RealmTestHelpers;

class ProjectTest extends TestCase
{
    use RealmTestHelpers;

    public function test_projects_are_isolated(): void
    {
        $acme = $this->createRealm('acme');
        $globex = $this->createRealm('globex');

        $this->actingAsRealm($acme, fn() => Project::create(['name' => 'Acme Project']));
        $this->actingAsRealm($globex, fn() => Project::create(['name' => 'Globex Project']));

        $this->assertRealmCount($acme, Project::class, 1);
        $this->assertRealmMissing($acme, Project::class, ['name' => 'Globex Project']);
    }
}

Blueprint Macro

$table->realm();                   // Default: restrictOnDelete (safe)
$table->realm(cascade: true);      // Opt-in: cascadeOnDelete

restrictOnDelete is the default — deleting a tenant fails with a foreign key error, forcing you to handle data cleanup explicitly.

Configuration

After installation, the config lives at config/realm.php:

strategy — 'column' (only option currently)
resolvers — array of resolver classes
strict — true (fail-closed on missing context)
cache.prefix — true (auto-prefix cache keys per tenant)
queue.context — true (propagate tenant context to queued jobs)
storage.prefix_path — true (auto-prefix storage paths per tenant)
user_model — the user model class for tenant-user relationships
on_fail — 'abort' (abort/redirect/exception on resolution failure)

Why not stancl/tenancy?

Use stancl if you need database-per-tenant today — it has years of battle-testing we don't. Realm is for the 80% of SaaS apps that only need column-based row isolation and want it with one trait, one macro, and fail-closed defaults out of the box.

Roadmap

v0.1 — Column strategy, subdomain + header resolution, strict mode, test helpers
v0.2 (current) — Cache/queue/storage isolation, encrypted secrets, tenant users, 5 new resolvers, per-tenant config overrides, realm:delete/realm:exec/realm:run-for-each commands
v1.0 — Database-per-tenant and schema-per-tenant strategies

License

MIT. See LICENSE.

mahdisphp / laravel-realm

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