A pageable Collection implementation for Laravel

README.md

Paginated Collections in Laravel

Use Case

Laravel provides pagination out of the box for Eloquent Collections, but you can't use that by default on ordinary Collections.

Collections do have the forPage() method, but it's more low-level, so it doesn't generate pagination links.

So you have to create a LengthAwarePaginator instance. But what if you want the behaviour to be the same as an Eloquent collection? Then use this macro!

The benefit of this is that the syntax and output is almost identical to the Eloquent Collection paginate() method and so it can (relatively) easily be swapped out for an Eloquent Collection when testing.

Installation

Feel free to copy the most relevant code into your project. You're free to use and adapt as you need.

Usage

There are 2 approaches below. Which one you use is up to you, but you don't need both. I personally prefer the macro method as I feel it's cleaner and works well with minimal effort, but it's not so good at working with your IDE (code hints etc) and can feel a little detached in some cases.

The macro way

If you prefer, add the Collection macro to a Service Provider. That way you can call paginate() on any collection:

collect([ ... ])->paginate( 20 );

See AppServiceProvider.php for a sample implementation.

The subclass way

Where you want a "pageable" collection that is distinct from the standard Illuminate\Support\Collection, implement a copy of Collection.php in your application and simply replace your use Illuminate\Support\Collection statements at the top of your dependent files with use App\Support\Collection:

- use Illuminate\Support\Collection
+ use App\Support\Collection;

$collection = (new Collection([ ... ]))->paginate(20);

Note that this approach won't work with the collect() helper function.

More Collection goodies

Spatie have create an awesome Composer package of loads of useful Collection macros. Go check it out!

AppServiceProvider.php

<?php

namespace App\Providers;

use Illuminate\Support\Collection;
use Illuminate\Pagination\LengthAwarePaginator;

class AppServiceProvider extends ServiceProvider
{
    public function boot()
    {
        /**
         * Paginate a standard Laravel Collection.
         *
         * @param int $perPage
         * @param int $total
         * @param int $page
         * @param string $pageName
         * @return array
         */
        Collection::macro('paginate', function($perPage, $total = null, $page = null, $pageName = 'page'): LengthAwarePaginator {
            $page = $page ?: LengthAwarePaginator::resolveCurrentPage($pageName);

            return new LengthAwarePaginator(
                $this->forPage($page, $perPage)->values(),
                $total ?: $this->count(),
                $perPage,
                $page,
                [
                    'path' => LengthAwarePaginator::resolveCurrentPath(),
                    'pageName' => $pageName,
                ]
            );
        });
    }
}

Collection.php

<?php

namespace App\Support;

use Illuminate\Pagination\LengthAwarePaginator;
use Illuminate\Support\Collection as BaseCollection;

class Collection extends BaseCollection
{
    public function paginate($perPage, $total = null, $page = null, $pageName = 'page'): LengthAwarePaginator
    {
        $page = $page ?: LengthAwarePaginator::resolveCurrentPage($pageName);
      
        return new LengthAwarePaginator(
            $this->forPage($page, $perPage)->values(),
            $total ?: $this->count(),
            $perPage,
            $page,
            [
                'path' => LengthAwarePaginator::resolveCurrentPath(),
                'pageName' => $pageName,
            ]
        );
    }
}

Good day, I tried all the above and nothing worked. I stumbled across this article on Stack Overflow and it used a method called toQuery(). This method, returns an Eloquent query builder instance containing a whereIn constraint on the collection model's primary keys. Invoke paginate(10) method from it.

$movies= Movie::get()->toQuery()->paginate(20);

Hi, works great with Livewire. How can I use this with simplePaginate so only next and previous buttons are shown in the links() ?

Edit: looks like simplePaginate works at the mobile breakpoint. Using Livewire and Tailwind.

Hi, works great with Livewire. How can I use this with simplePaginate so only next and previous buttons are shown in the links() ?

Edit: looks like simplePaginate works at the mobile breakpoint. Using Livewire and Tailwind.

@patrykszady, In order to use simplePaginate() method, kindly change the above sample code to the following:

$movies= Movie::get()->toQuery()->simplePaginate(20);

To customize your links please read the documentation here first and also look at a tutorial here.

An update to this Anyone with multiple Paginators on a page running into an error should go with this approach. In my case i have Livewire components and trying to paginate a custom collection was a pain until I implemented the solution below.
Use the macro function with all the corrections up until this point. If possible, rename the function to avoid conflicts.
Do this to set a custom page name which would allow you reset and not affect other paginators
return view('foo.bar', ['foo' => ,(your-custom-collection)->paginateCustom(3, null,null, 'barPage')]);

I've updated the code to reflect some of the comments and adjustments that others have shared in earlier comments here.

Just what I've been looking for. This will allow me to search custom model attributes in my paginated table.

Wow, thank you @simonhamp! This really helped me out on collections containing different eloquent models 😍