Prisma CLI Migrate Deploy

prisma migrate deploy

Applies pending migrations in production/staging environments.

Command

prisma migrate deploy

What It Does

• Applies all pending migrations from prisma/migrations/
• Updates _prisma_migrations table
• Does NOT generate new migrations
• Does NOT run seed scripts
• Safe for CI/CD and production

Options

When to Use

• Production deployments
• Staging environments
• CI/CD pipelines
• Any non-development environment

Examples

Basic deployment

prisma migrate deploy

In CI/CD pipeline

# GitHub Actions example
- name: Apply migrations
  run: npx prisma migrate deploy
  env:
    DATABASE_URL: ${{ secrets.DATABASE_URL }}

Docker deployment

# Run migrations before starting app
CMD npx prisma migrate deploy && node dist/index.js

Comparison with migrate dev

Production Workflow

1. Development: Create migrations locally

   prisma migrate dev --name add_feature
   

2. Commit: Include migration files in version control

   git add prisma/migrations
   git commit -m "Add feature migration"
   

3. Deploy: Apply in production

   prisma migrate deploy
   

Error Handling

Failed migration

If a migration fails, migrate deploy exits with error. The failed migration is marked as failed in _prisma_migrations.

To fix:

1. Resolve the issue (fix SQL, database state, etc.)
2. Mark as resolved: prisma migrate resolve --applied <migration_name>
3. Re-run: prisma migrate deploy

Check status first

prisma migrate status

Shows pending and applied migrations before deploying.

Configuration

Ensure prisma.config.ts has the production database URL:

import 'dotenv/config'
import { defineConfig, env } from 'prisma/config'

export default defineConfig({
  datasource: {
    url: env('DATABASE_URL'),
  },
})

Best Practices

1. Always run migrate status before migrate deploy in CI
2. Have a rollback plan (backup before migrations)
3. Test migrations in staging first
4. Never use migrate dev in production