Collections

Work with arrays of data using Laravel’s Collection class — a fluent, chainable wrapper with over 100 methods for transforming, filtering, and aggregating data.

What is a collection?

Illuminate\Support\Collection is a wrapper around a PHP array that lets you chain operations instead of nesting array functions. Every method that transforms data returns a new collection, leaving the original untouched.

// PHP array functions — hard to read, inside-out
$names = array_values(array_filter(
    array_map(fn ($user) => $user['name'], $users),
    fn ($name) => strlen($name) > 0
));

// Collection — left to right, easy to follow
$names = collect($users)
    ->pluck('name')
    ->filter()
    ->values()
    ->all();

Collections are immutable. Each transformation method returns a new collection instance, so you can branch a pipeline without affecting earlier steps.

Creating collections

// From an array
$products = collect([
    ['name' => 'Laptop', 'price' => 1299, 'in_stock' => true],
    ['name' => 'Mouse',  'price' => 29,   'in_stock' => false],
    ['name' => 'Keyboard', 'price' => 79, 'in_stock' => true],
]);

// Empty collection
$empty = collect();

// From a JSON string
$items = Collection::fromJson('[{"id":1},{"id":2}]');

Eloquent’s get() always returns an Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Collection, which extends Collection and supports all the same methods.

Essential methods

map — transform each item

$prices = collect([1299, 29, 79]);

$withTax = $prices->map(fn ($price) => round($price * 1.08, 2));
// [1402.92, 31.32, 85.32]

filter and reject — narrow the set

$products = collect([
    ['name' => 'Laptop',   'in_stock' => true],
    ['name' => 'Mouse',    'in_stock' => false],
    ['name' => 'Keyboard', 'in_stock' => true],
]);

$available = $products->filter(fn ($p) => $p['in_stock']);
$soldOut   = $products->reject(fn ($p) => $p['in_stock']);

// No callback — removes falsy values (null, false, '', 0)
$cleaned = collect(['Alice', '', null, 'Bob'])->filter()->values();
// ['Alice', 'Bob']

After filter(), the original keys are preserved. Call values() to re-index from 0 when you need a sequential array.

first and last — retrieve one item

$orders = collect([
    ['id' => 1, 'status' => 'shipped'],
    ['id' => 2, 'status' => 'pending'],
    ['id' => 3, 'status' => 'pending'],
]);

$nextOrder = $orders->first(fn ($o) => $o['status'] === 'pending');
// ['id' => 2, 'status' => 'pending']

$latest = $orders->last();
// ['id' => 3, 'status' => 'pending']

pluck — extract one field

$users = collect([
    ['id' => 1, 'name' => 'Alice', 'role' => 'admin'],
    ['id' => 2, 'name' => 'Bob',   'role' => 'editor'],
]);

$names = $users->pluck('name');
// ['Alice', 'Bob']

// Keyed by id
$nameById = $users->pluck('name', 'id');
// [1 => 'Alice', 2 => 'Bob']

groupBy — organize by a key

$users = collect([
    ['name' => 'Alice', 'department' => 'Engineering'],
    ['name' => 'Bob',   'department' => 'Sales'],
    ['name' => 'Carol', 'department' => 'Engineering'],
]);

$byDept = $users->groupBy('department');
// [
//   'Engineering' => [['name' => 'Alice', ...], ['name' => 'Carol', ...]],
//   'Sales'       => [['name' => 'Bob',   ...]],
// ]

sortBy and sortByDesc — reorder

$products = collect([
    ['name' => 'Laptop',   'price' => 1299],
    ['name' => 'Mouse',    'price' => 29],
    ['name' => 'Keyboard', 'price' => 79],
]);

$cheapFirst     = $products->sortBy('price');
$expensiveFirst = $products->sortByDesc('price');

// Sort by multiple keys
$sorted = $products->sortBy([
    ['price', 'asc'],
    ['name',  'asc'],
]);

each — run side effects

$orders->each(function (array $order) {
    \Log::info("Processing order #{$order['id']}");
});

// Return false to stop the loop early
$orders->each(function (array $order) {
    if ($order['status'] === 'cancelled') {
        return false;
    }
    // ...
});

reduce — fold to a single value

$cart = collect([
    ['name' => 'Laptop',   'qty' => 1, 'price' => 1299],
    ['name' => 'Mouse',    'qty' => 2, 'price' => 29],
    ['name' => 'Keyboard', 'qty' => 1, 'price' => 79],
]);

$total = $cart->reduce(
    fn ($carry, $item) => $carry + ($item['qty'] * $item['price']),
    0
);
// 1436

For simple sums, sum() is more readable: $cart->sum(fn ($i) => $i['qty'] * $i['price']).

reduceInto — accumulate into an object

Like reduce, reduceInto folds a collection into a result, but its callback does not need to return a value. It is useful when mutating an existing object directly.

class OrderStats
{
    public int $total = 0;
    public int $count = 0;
}

$orders = collect([
    ['amount' => 100],
    ['amount' => 250],
    ['amount' => 50],
]);

$stats = $orders->reduceInto(new OrderStats, function (OrderStats $stats, array $order) {
    $stats->total += $order['amount'];
    $stats->count++;
});

$stats->total; // 400
$stats->count; // 3

With reduce, the callback return value becomes the next $carry, making it well suited to primitive values. With reduceInto, you keep mutating the same object, which often results in simpler code.

To accumulate into a scalar or array, pass the callback value by reference (&):

$collection = collect([1, 2, 3, 4, 5]);

$even = $collection->reduceInto([], function (array &$result, int $value) {
    if ($value % 2 === 0) {
        $result[] = $value;
    }
});

// [2, 4]

chunk — split into batches

$users = collect(range(1, 100))->map(fn ($i) => ['id' => $i]);

// Split into groups of 20
$batches = $users->chunk(20);

$batches->each(function ($batch) {
    // send a batch email, bulk insert, etc.
});

flatMap — map then flatten one level

$users = collect([
    ['name' => 'Alice', 'tags' => ['php', 'laravel']],
    ['name' => 'Bob',   'tags' => ['python', 'django']],
]);

$allTags = $users->flatMap(fn ($u) => $u['tags']);
// ['php', 'laravel', 'python', 'django']

Method chaining

The real power of collections is composing transformations:

$orders = collect([
    ['customer' => 'Alice', 'status' => 'completed', 'amount' => 250, 'category' => 'hardware'],
    ['customer' => 'Bob',   'status' => 'pending',   'amount' => 80,  'category' => 'hardware'],
    ['customer' => 'Carol', 'status' => 'completed', 'amount' => 420, 'category' => 'software'],
    ['customer' => 'Dave',  'status' => 'completed', 'amount' => 150, 'category' => 'hardware'],
]);

// Top completed hardware orders, formatted for display
$result = $orders
    ->filter(fn ($o) => $o['status'] === 'completed')
    ->filter(fn ($o) => $o['category'] === 'hardware')
    ->sortByDesc('amount')
    ->map(fn ($o) => [
        'customer' => $o['customer'],
        'amount'   => '$' . number_format($o['amount']),
    ])
    ->values();

// [
//   ['customer' => 'Alice', 'amount' => '$250'],
//   ['customer' => 'Dave',  'amount' => '$150'],
// ]

Working with Eloquent collections

Eloquent returns Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Collection from get(), which extends the base Collection and adds a few extras:

$users = User::all();

// Find a model by primary key
$user = $users->find(1);

// Load relationships on an already-fetched collection
$users->load('orders', 'profile');

// Get all primary keys
$ids = $users->modelKeys();   // [1, 2, 3, ...]

// Set operations
$diff      = $users->diff($otherUsers);
$intersect = $users->intersect($otherUsers);

Filter and sort in the database when you can. Doing it on a collection means all rows are loaded into memory first. Use where() and orderBy() on the query before calling get().

Lazy collections

LazyCollection uses PHP generators to process one item at a time, keeping memory flat regardless of how many records are in the result set.

use Illuminate\Support\LazyCollection;

// Standard collection — all 100k rows in memory
$users = User::all();

// LazyCollection — one row at a time
User::cursor()->each(function (User $user) {
    // process $user, then move to the next
});

Creating a lazy collection

$lazy = LazyCollection::make(function () {
    $handle = fopen('large-export.csv', 'r');

    while (($row = fgetcsv($handle)) !== false) {
        yield $row;
    }

    fclose($handle);
});

Chaining on a lazy collection

Lazy collection methods are evaluated on demand, so you can chain filter(), map(), and each() without pulling everything into memory:

User::where('subscribed', true)
    ->cursor()
    ->filter(fn (User $user) => $user->plan === 'pro')
    ->each(fn (User $user) => $user->sendMonthlyReport());

cursor() keeps a single database connection open for the duration of the loop. For very long-running loops, consider using chunk() to release and re-acquire the connection between batches.

Common methods at a glance

Method	Purpose
map($fn)	Transform each item
filter($fn)	Keep items that pass a test
reject($fn)	Remove items that pass a test
first($fn)	First matching item
last($fn)	Last matching item
pluck($key)	Extract one field from each item
groupBy($key)	Group items into sub-collections
sortBy($key)	Sort ascending
sortByDesc($key)	Sort descending
each($fn)	Side-effect iteration
flatMap($fn)	Map then flatten one level
reduce($fn, $init)	Accumulate to a single value
chunk($n)	Split into batches
values()	Reindex keys from 0
sum($key)	Sum a column
count()	Number of items
unique($key)	Remove duplicates
contains($key, $val)	Check membership
toArray()	Convert back to a plain array
toJson()	Serialize to JSON