Prisma Config reference

The Prisma Config file configures the Prisma CLI, including subcommands like migrate and studio, using TypeScript.

You can define your config in either of two ways:

• Using the defineConfig helper:

  import "dotenv/config";
  
  import { defineConfig, env } from "prisma/config";
  
  export default defineConfig({
  
    schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",
  
    migrations: {
  
      path: "prisma/migrations",
  
      seed: "tsx prisma/seed.ts",
  
    },
  
    datasource: {
  
      url: env("DATABASE_URL"),
  
    },
  
  });

• Using TypeScript's satisfies operator with the PrismaConfig type:

  import "dotenv/config";
  
  import type { PrismaConfig } from "prisma";
  
  import { env } from "prisma/config";
  
  export default {
  
    schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",
  
    migrations: {
  
      path: "prisma/migrations",
  
      seed: "tsx prisma/seed.ts",
  
    },
  
    datasource: {
  
      url: env("DATABASE_URL"),
  
    },
  
  } satisfies PrismaConfig;

Here is a simplified version of the PrismaConfig type:

export declare type PrismaConfig = {

  // Whether features with an unstable API are enabled.

  experimental: {

    externalTables: boolean;

  };

  // The path to the schema file, or path to a folder that shall be recursively searched for *.prisma files.

  schema?: string;

  // Configuration for Prisma migrations.

  migrations?: {

    path: string;

    seed: string;

    initShadowDb: string;

  };

  // Configuration for the database view entities.

  views?: {

    path: string;

  };

  // Configuration for the `typedSql` preview feature.

  typedSql?: {

    path: string;

  };

  // Database connection configuration

  datasource?: {

    url: string;

    shadowDatabaseUrl?: string;

  };

};

Prisma Config files can be named as prisma.config.* or .config/prisma.* with the extensions js, ts, mjs, cjs, mts, or cts. Other extensions are supported to ensure compatibility with different TypeScript compiler settings.

Configures how Prisma ORM locates and loads your schema file(s). Can be a file or folder path. Relative paths are resolved relative to the prisma.config.ts file location. See Multi-file Prisma schema for more info about schema location options.

These options declare tables and enums in your database that are managed externally (not by Prisma Migrate). You can still query them with Prisma Client, but they will be ignored by migrations.

Example:

import "dotenv/config";

import { defineConfig, env } from "prisma/config";

export default defineConfig({

  schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",

  migrations: {

    path: "prisma/migrations",

  },

  datasource: {

    url: env("DATABASE_URL"),

  },

  experimental: {

    externalTables: true,

  },

  tables: {

    external: ["public.users"],

  },

  enums: {

    external: ["public.role"],

  },

});

Learn more about the externalTables feature here.

The path to the directory where Prisma should store migration files, and look for them.

This option allows you to define a script that Prisma runs when you execute the npx prisma db seed command. The string should be a command that can be executed in your terminal, such as with node, ts-node, or tsx.

Example:

import "dotenv/config";

import { defineConfig, env } from "prisma/config";

export default defineConfig({

  schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",

  migrations: {

    path: "prisma/migrations",

    seed: "tsx db/seed.ts",

  },

  datasource: {

    url: env("DATABASE_URL"),

  },

});

This option allows you to define SQL statements that Prisma runs on the shadow database before creating migrations. It is useful when working with external managed tables, as Prisma needs to know about the structure of these tables to correctly generate migrations.

Example:

import "dotenv/config";

import { defineConfig, env } from "prisma/config";

export default defineConfig({

  schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",

  migrations: {

    path: "prisma/migrations",

    initShadowDb: `

      CREATE TABLE public.users (id SERIAL PRIMARY KEY);

    `,

  },

  datasource: {

    url: env("DATABASE_URL"),

  },

  experimental: {

    externalTables: true,

  },

  tables: {

    external: ["public.users"],

  },

});

Learn more about the externalTables feature here.

The path to the directory where Prisma should look for the SQL view definitions.

The path to the directory where Prisma should look for the SQL files used for generating typings via typedSql.

Enables specific experimental features in the Prisma CLI.

Example:

import "dotenv/config";

import { defineConfig, env } from "prisma/config";

export default defineConfig({

  schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",

  migrations: {

    path: "prisma/migrations",

  },

  datasource: {

    url: env("DATABASE_URL"),

  },

  experimental: {

    externalTables: true,

  },

});

Connection URL including authentication info. Most connectors use the syntax provided by the database.

Example:

import "dotenv/config";

import { defineConfig, env } from "prisma/config";

export default defineConfig({

  schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",

  migrations: {

    path: "prisma/migrations",

  },

  datasource: {

    url: env("DATABASE_URL"),

  },

});

Connection URL to the shadow database used by Prisma Migrate. Allows you to use a cloud-hosted database as the shadow database.

import path from "node:path";

import type { PrismaConfig } from "prisma";

import { PrismaD1 } from "@prisma/adapter-d1";

export default {

  experimental: {

    adapter: true,

  },

  engine: "js",

  schema: path.join("prisma", "schema.prisma"),

  async adapter() {

    return new PrismaD1({

      CLOUDFLARE_D1_TOKEN: process.env.CLOUDFLARE_D1_TOKEN,

      CLOUDFLARE_ACCOUNT_ID: process.env.CLOUDFLARE_ACCOUNT_ID,

      CLOUDFLARE_DATABASE_ID: process.env.CLOUDFLARE_DATABASE_ID,

    });

  },

} satisfies PrismaConfig;

import "dotenv/config";

import path from "node:path";

import { defineConfig, env } from "prisma/config";

export default defineConfig({

  engine: "classic",

  datasource: {

    url: env("DATABASE_URL"),

  },

  schema: path.join("prisma", "schema.prisma"),

});

import type { PrismaConfig } from "prisma";

export default {

  experimental: {

    studio: true,

  },

  engine: "js",

  studio: {

    adapter: async (env: Env) => {

      const { PrismaLibSQL } = await import("@prisma/adapter-libsql");

      const { createClient } = await import("@libsql/client");

      const libsql = createClient({

        url: env.DOTENV_PRISMA_STUDIO_LIBSQL_DATABASE_URL,

      });

      return new PrismaLibSQL(libsql);

    },

  },

} satisfies PrismaConfig;

To get started with Prisma Config, create a prisma.config.ts file in your project root. You can use either of these approaches:

Using defineConfig:

import "dotenv/config";

import { defineConfig, env } from "prisma/config";

export default defineConfig({

  schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",

  migrations: {

    path: "prisma/migrations",

  },

  datasource: {

    url: env("DATABASE_URL"),

  },

});

Using TypeScript types:

import "dotenv/config";

import type { PrismaConfig } from "prisma";

import { env } from "prisma/config";

export default {

  schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",

  migrations: {

    path: "prisma/migrations",

  },

  datasource: {

    url: env("DATABASE_URL"),

  },

} satisfies PrismaConfig;

When using prisma.config.ts, environment variables from .env files need to be loaded explicitly. There are several approaches depending on your runtime and Node version:

1. Install the dotenv package:

bun add dotenv

pnpm prisma validate
# → Works as expected

yarn prisma validate
# → Works as expected

npx prisma validate
# → Works as expected

2. Import dotenv/config at the top of your prisma.config.ts file:

import "dotenv/config";

import { defineConfig, env } from "prisma/config";

export default defineConfig({

  schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",

  migrations: {

    path: "prisma/migrations",

    seed: "tsx prisma/seed.ts",

  },

  datasource: {

    url: env("DATABASE_URL"),

  },

});

If using Node.js v20+ or tsx, you can pass a --env-file flag to automatically load environment variables:

tsx --env-title=".env" src/index.ts

tsx watch --env-title=".env" --env-title=".local.env" src/index.ts

tsx --env-title=".env" ./prisma/seed.ts

For Bun, .env files are automatically loaded without additional configuration. The import 'dotenv/config' line that prisma init generates is not needed when using Bun and can be safely removed from your prisma.config.ts file.

Use the env() helper function to provide type-safe access to environment variables:

import "dotenv/config";

import { defineConfig, env } from "prisma/config";

type Env = {

  DATABASE_URL: string;

};

export default defineConfig({

  schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",

  migrations: {

    path: "prisma/migrations",

  },

  datasource: {

    url: env<Env>("DATABASE_URL"),

  },

});

The env() helper function from prisma/config throws an error if the specified environment variable is not defined. This is important to understand because:

• Every Prisma CLI command loads the prisma.config.ts file
• Only some commands actually need the datasource.url value (e.g., prisma db *, prisma migrate *, prisma generate --sql)
• Commands like prisma generate don't need a database URL, but will still fail if env() throws an error when loading the config file

For example, if you run prisma generate without DATABASE_URL set, and your config uses env('DATABASE_URL'), you'll see:

Error: PrismaConfigEnvError: Missing required environment variable: DATABASE_URL

Solution: If your environment variable isn't guaranteed to exist (e.g., in CI/CD pipelines where you only run prisma generate for type-checking), don't use the env() helper. Instead, access the environment variable directly:

import "dotenv/config";

import { defineConfig } from "prisma/config";

export default defineConfig({

  schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",

  migrations: {

    path: "prisma/migrations",

  },

  datasource: {

    url: process.env.DATABASE_URL!, // Or use: process.env.DATABASE_URL ?? '' to provide a fallback value

  },

});

If you want to split your Prisma schema into multiple files, you need to specify the path to your Prisma schema folder via the schema property:

import path from "node:path";

import type { PrismaConfig } from "prisma";

export default {

  schema: path.join("prisma", "schema"),

} satisfies PrismaConfig;

In that case, your migrations directory must be located next to the .prisma file that defines the datasource block.

For example, assuming schema.prisma defines the datasource, here's where to place the migrations folder:

# `migrations` and `schema.prisma` are on the same level

.

├── migrations

├── models

│   ├── posts.prisma

│   └── users.prisma

└── schema.prisma

Prisma CLI commands such as prisma validate or prisma migrate use prisma.config.ts (or .config/prisma.ts) to locate your Prisma schema and other resources.

Key rules:

• Paths defined in the config file (e.g., schema, migrations) are always resolved relative to the location of the config file, not where you run the CLI command from.
• The CLI must first find the config file itself, which depends on how Prisma is installed and the package manager used.

When Prisma is installed locally and run via pnpm prisma, the config file is detected automatically whether you run the command from the project root or a subdirectory.

Example project tree:

.

├── node_modules

├── package.json

├── prisma-custom

│   └── schema.prisma

├── prisma.config.ts

└── src

Example run from the project root:

pnpm prisma validate

# → Loaded Prisma config from ./prisma.config.ts

# → Prisma schema loaded from prisma-custom/schema.prisma

Example run from a subdirectory:

cd src

pnpm prisma validate

# → Still finds prisma.config.ts and resolves schema correctly

When running via npx prisma or bunx prisma, the CLI only detects the config file if the command is run from the project root (where package.json declares Prisma).

Example run from the project root:

bunx prisma validate

# → Works as expected

cd src
pnpm prisma validate
# → Error: Could not find Prisma Schema...

cd src
yarn prisma validate
# → Error: Could not find Prisma Schema...

cd src
npx prisma validate
# → Error: Could not find Prisma Schema...

Run from a subdirectory (fails):

cd src

bunx prisma validate

# → Error: Could not find Prisma Schema...

pnpm prisma validate --config ../prisma.config.ts

yarn prisma validate --config ../prisma.config.ts

npx prisma validate --config ../prisma.config.ts

To fix this, you can use the --config flag:

bunx prisma validate --config ../prisma.config.ts

pnpm add dotenv

yarn add dotenv

npm install dotenv

If Prisma is installed globally (npm i -g prisma), it may not find your prisma.config.ts or prisma/config module by default. To avoid issues:

• Prefer local Prisma installations in your project.
• Or use prisma/config locally and pass --config to point to your config file.

• If Prisma is installed in the workspace root, pnpm prisma will detect the config file from subdirectories.
• If Prisma is installed in a subpackage (e.g., ./packages/db), run commands from that package directory or deeper.

You can specify a custom location for your config file when running Prisma CLI commands:

prisma validate --config ./path/to/myconfig.ts

To load environment variables in your Prisma application, you can use the prisma.config.ts file along with the env helper from prisma/config.

1. Install the dotenv package:

   • bun
   • pnpm
   • yarn
   • npm

   bun add dotenv

2. Create a .env file in your project root (if it doesn't exist) and add your database connection string:

   DATABASE_URL="your_database_connection_string_here"

3. Ensure your prisma.config.ts file imports dotenv/config at the top:

   import "dotenv/config"; 
   
   import { defineConfig, env } from "prisma/config";
   
   export default defineConfig({
   
     schema: "prisma/schema.prisma",
   
     migrations: {
   
       path: "prisma/migrations",
   
       seed: "tsx prisma/seed.ts",
   
     },
   
     datasource: {
   
       url: env("DATABASE_URL"),
   
     },
   
   });