Using Permissions via Roles

Assigning Roles

A role can be assigned to any user:

$user->assignRole('writer');

// You can also assign multiple roles at once
$user->assignRole('writer', 'admin');
// or as an array
$user->assignRole(['writer', 'admin']);

A role can be removed from a user:

$user->removeRole('writer');

Roles can also be synced:

// All current roles will be removed from the user and replaced by the array given
$user->syncRoles(['writer', 'admin']);

Assigning Models to a Role

Sometimes it is more convenient to work from the role's side, for example when building an admin screen that lists every user with a given role. The assignToModels, removeFromModels, and syncModels methods on a role do the inverse of assignRole, removeRole, and syncRoles:

$role = Role::findByName('writer');

// Give the role to two users at once.
$role->assignToModels([$user1, $user2]);

// Remove it from one user.
$role->removeFromModels($user1);

// Replace every model that currently has this role with a new set.
$role->syncModels([$user2, $user3]);

Each method also accepts a single model, a single ID, an array of IDs, a Collection, or a mix of models and IDs:

$role->assignToModels($user);                  // a single model
$role->assignToModels($user->id);              // a single ID
$role->assignToModels([1, 2, 3]);              // an array of IDs
$role->assignToModels(User::query()->get());   // a Collection
$role->assignToModels([$user1, 5, $user2]);    // mixed

When you pass raw IDs, the package needs to know which model class they belong to. By default it uses the model registered for the role's guard (the same model Auth::user() returns). You can override this in two ways.

Pass the class as the second argument:

$role->assignToModels([1, 2, 3], User::class);

Or set a default once in config/permission.php:

'models' => [
    // ...
    'default_model' => App\Models\User::class,
],

If you need to assign the role to different model types in the same call, pass them as instances. The role can be assigned to any model that uses the HasRoles trait, not just users:

$role->assignToModels([$user, $admin, $apiClient]);

Checking Roles

You can determine if a user has a certain role:

$user->hasRole('writer');

// or at least one role from an array of roles:
$user->hasRole(['editor', 'moderator']);

You can also determine if a user has any of a given list of roles:

$user->hasAnyRole(['writer', 'reader']);
// or
$user->hasAnyRole('writer', 'reader');

You can also determine if a user has all of a given list of roles:

$user->hasAllRoles(Role::all());

You can also determine if a user has exactly all of a given list of roles:

$user->hasExactRoles(Role::all());

The assignRole, hasRole, hasAnyRole, hasAllRoles, hasExactRoles and removeRole functions can accept a string, a \Spatie\Permission\Models\Role object or an \Illuminate\Support\Collection object.

Assigning Permissions to Roles

A permission can be given to a role:

$role->givePermissionTo('edit articles');

You can determine if a role has a certain permission:

$role->hasPermissionTo('edit articles');

A permission can be revoked from a role:

$role->revokePermissionTo('edit articles');

Or revoke & add new permissions in one go:

$role->syncPermissions(['edit articles', 'delete articles']);

The givePermissionTo and revokePermissionTo functions can accept a string or a Spatie\Permission\Models\Permission object.

NOTE: Permissions are inherited from roles automatically.

What Permissions Does A Role Have?

The permissions property on any given role returns a collection with all the related permission objects. This collection can respond to usual Eloquent Collection operations, such as count, sort, etc.

// get collection
$role->permissions;

// return only the permission names:
$role->permissions->pluck('name');

// count the number of permissions assigned to a role
count($role->permissions);
// or
$role->permissions->count();

Assigning Direct Permissions To A User

Additionally, individual permissions can be assigned to the user too. For instance:

$role = Role::findByName('writer');
$role->givePermissionTo('edit articles');

$user->assignRole('writer');

$user->givePermissionTo('delete articles');

In the above example, a role is given permission to edit articles and this role is assigned to a user. Now the user can edit articles and additionally delete articles. The permission of 'delete articles' is the user's direct permission because it is assigned directly to them. When we call $user->hasDirectPermission('delete articles') it returns true, but false for $user->hasDirectPermission('edit articles').

This method is useful if one builds a form for setting permissions for roles and users in an application and wants to restrict or change inherited permissions of roles of the user, i.e. allowing to change only direct permissions of the user.

You can check if the user has a Specific or All or Any of a set of permissions directly assigned:

// Check if the user has Direct permission
$user->hasDirectPermission('edit articles')

// Check if the user has All direct permissions
$user->hasAllDirectPermissions(['edit articles', 'delete articles']);

// Check if the user has Any permission directly
$user->hasAnyDirectPermission(['create articles', 'delete articles']);

By following the previous example, when we call $user->hasAllDirectPermissions(['edit articles', 'delete articles']) it returns false, because the user does not have edit articles as a direct permission. When we call $user->hasAnyDirectPermission('edit articles'), it returns true because the user has one of the provided permissions.

You can examine all of these permissions:

// Direct permissions
$user->getDirectPermissions() // Or $user->permissions;

// Permissions inherited from the user's roles
$user->getPermissionsViaRoles();

// All permissions which apply on the user (inherited and direct)
$user->getAllPermissions();

All these responses are collections of Spatie\Permission\Models\Permission objects.

If we follow the previous example, the first response will be a collection with the delete article permission and the second will be a collection with the edit article permission and the third will contain both.