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Extensions

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Prisma Client extensions are Generally Available from versions 4.16.0 and later. They were introduced in Preview in version 4.7.0. Make sure you enable the clientExtensions Preview feature flag if you are running on a version earlier than 4.16.0.

You can use Prisma Client extensions to add functionality to your models, result objects, and queries, or to add client-level methods.

You can create an extension with one or more of the following component types:

For example, you might create an extension that uses the model and client component types.

About Prisma Client extensions​

When you use a Prisma Client extension, you create an extended client. An extended client is a lightweight variant of the standard Prisma Client that is wrapped by one or more extensions. The standard client is not mutated. You can add as many extended clients as you want to your project. Learn more about extended clients.

You can associate a single extension, or multiple extensions, with an extended client. Learn more about multiple extensions.

You can share your Prisma Client extensions with other Prisma ORM users, and import Prisma Client extensions developed by other users into your Prisma ORM project.

Extended clients​

Extended clients interact with each other, and with the standard client, as follows:

  • Each extended client operates independently in an isolated instance.
  • Extended clients cannot conflict with each other, or with the standard client.
  • All extended clients and the standard client communicate with the same Prisma ORM query engine.
  • All extended clients and the standard client share the same connection pool.

Note: The author of an extension can modify this behavior since they're able to run arbitrary code as part of an extension. For example, an extension might actually create an entirely new PrismaClient instance (including its own query engine and connection pool). Be sure to check the documentation of the extension you're using to learn about any specific behavior it might implement.

Example use cases for extended clients​

Because extended clients operate in isolated instances, they can be a good way to do the following, for example:

  • Implement row-level security (RLS), where each HTTP request has its own client with its own RLS extension, customized with session data. This can keep each user entirely separate, each in a separate client.
  • Add a user.current() method for the User model to get the currently logged-in user.
  • Enable more verbose logging for requests if a debug cookie is set.
  • Attach a unique request id to all logs so that you can correlate them later, for example to help you analyze the operations that Prisma Client carries out.
  • Remove a delete method from models unless the application calls the admin endpoint and the user has the necessary privileges.

Add an extension to Prisma Client​

You can create an extension using two primary ways:

  • Use the client-level $extends method

    const xprisma = prisma.$extends({
      name: 'signUp', // Optional: name appears in error logs
      model: {        // This is a `model` component
        user: { ... } // The extension logic for the `user` model goes inside the curly braces
      },
    })

  • Use the Prisma.defineExtension method to define an extension and assign it to a variable, and then pass the extension to the client-level $extends method

    import { Prisma } from '@prisma/client'

    // Define the extension
    const myExtension = Prisma.defineExtension({
      name: 'signUp', // Optional: name appears in error logs
      model: {        // This is a `model` component
        user: { ... } // The extension logic for the `user` model goes inside the curly braces
      },
    })

    // Pass the extension to a Prisma Client instance
    const xprisma = prisma.$extends(myExtension)
    tip

    This pattern is useful for when you would like to separate extensions into multiple files or directories within a project.

The above examples use the model extension component to extend the User model.

In your $extends method, use the appropriate extension component or components (model, client, result or query).

Name an extension for error logs​

You can name your extensions to help identify them in error logs. To do so, use the optional field name. For example:

const prisma = new PrismaClient().$extends({
  name: `signUp`,  // (Optional) Extension name
  model: {
    user: { ... }
 },
})

Multiple extensions​

You can associate an extension with an extended client in one of two ways:

  • You can associate it with an extended client on its own, or
  • You can combine the extension with other extensions and associate all of these extensions with an extended client. The functionality from these combined extensions applies to the same extended client. Note: Combined extensions can conflict.

You can combine the two approaches above. For example, you might associate one extension with its own extended client and associate two other extensions with another extended client. Learn more about how client instances interact.

Apply multiple extensions to an extended client​

In the following example, suppose that you have two extensions, extensionA and extensionB. There are two ways to combine these.

Option 1: Declare the new client in one line​

With this option, you apply both extensions to a new client in one line of code.

// First of all, store your original Prisma Client in a variable as usual
const prisma = new PrismaClient()

// Declare an extended client that has an extensionA and extensionB
const prismaAB = prisma.$extends(extensionA).$extends(extensionB)

You can then refer to prismaAB in your code, for example prismaAB.myExtensionMethod().

Option 2: Declare multiple extended clients​

The advantage of this option is that you can call any of the extended clients separately.

// First of all, store your original Prisma Client in a variable as usual
const prisma = new PrismaClient()

// Declare an extended client that has extensionA applied
const prismaA = prisma.$extends(extensionA)

// Declare an extended client that has extensionB applied
const prismaB = prisma.$extends(extensionB)

// Declare an extended client that is a combination of clientA and clientB
const prismaAB = prismaA.$extends(extensionB)

In your code, you can call any of these clients separately, for example prismaA.myExtensionMethod(), prismaB.myExtensionMethod(), or prismaAB.myExtensionMethod().

Conflicts in combined extensions​

When you combine two or more extensions into a single extended client, then the last extension that you declare takes precedence in any conflict. In the example in option 1 above, suppose there is a method called myExtensionMethod() defined in extensionA and a method called myExtensionMethod() in extensionB. When you call prismaAB.myExtensionMethod(), then Prisma Client uses myExtensionMethod() as defined in extensionB.

Type of an extended client​

You can infer the type of an extended Prisma Client instance using the typeof utility as follows:

const extendedPrismaClient = new PrismaClient().$extends({
  /** extension */
})

type ExtendedPrismaClient = typeof extendedPrismaClient

If you're using Prisma Client as a singleton, you can get the type of the extended Prisma Client instance using the typeof and ReturnType utilities as follows:

function getExtendedClient() {
  return new PrismaClient().$extends({
    /* extension */
  })
}

type ExtendedPrismaClient = ReturnType<typeof getExtendedClient>

Limitations​

Usage of $on and $use with extended clients​

$on and $use are not available in extended clients. If you would like to continue using these client-level methods with an extended client, you will need to hook them up before extending the client.

const prisma = new PrismaClient()

prisma.$use(async (params, next) => {
  console.log('This is middleware!')
  return next(params)
})

const xPrisma = prisma.$extends({
  name: 'myExtension',
  model: {
    user: {
      async signUp(email: string) {
        await prisma.user.create({ data: { email } })
      },
    },
  },
})

To learn more, see our documentation on $on and $use

Usage of client-level methods in extended clients​

Client-level methods do not necessarily exist on extended clients. For these clients you will need to first check for existence before using.

const xPrisma = prisma.$extends(...);

if (xPrisma.$connect) {
  xPrisma.$connect()
}

Usage with nested operations​

The query extension type does not support nested read and write operations.