Have you ever tried loading thousands of records simultaneously, only to find your app slowing down to crawl? Pagination is the solution that breaks down enormous datasets into manageable chunks, keeping your app performant and user-friendly. We’ll explore why pagination is essential and dive deep into the pagination options Laravel offers, from traditional offset-based pagination to efficient cursor-based pagination for real-time data.

Why is Pagination Important?

Pagination isn’t just a feature; it’s necessary for modern applications that handle substantial data volumes. Here’s why:

1. Improved Application Performance

• Database Queries: The database load decreases significantly when smaller data subsets are queryed.
• Reduced Memory Usage: Only necessary data is loaded, making memory use more efficient.
• Optimized Network Traffic: With fewer records transferred at a time, data loads faster, benefiting both server and client.

2. Enhanced User Experience

• Quick Page Loading: Faster load times prevent users from waiting.
• Intuitive Navigation: Breaking content into pages lets users quickly jump to specific areas.
• Organized Display: A structured layout makes content less overwhelming.

3. Resource Management

• Controlled Server Load: Lightens the server’s load, especially during peak times.
• Database Performance: Faster, predictable query times enhance reliability.
• Effective Caching: Cache smaller data portions more efficiently per page.

Basic Usage

Laravel provides three types of pagination:

1. Simple Pagination (No total count, faster for large datasets)
2. Full Pagination (Shows total pages & item count)
3. Cursor Pagination (Best for infinite scroll & large datasets)
4. Customize Pagination

1. Basic Pagination Example

// Controller
use App\Models\Post;

public function index()
{
    $posts = Post::paginate(10); // 10 items per page
    return view('posts.index', ['posts' => $posts]);
}

<!-- Blade View -->
@foreach ($posts as $post)
    <h2>{{ $post->title }}</h2>
    <p>{{ $post->excerpt }}</p>
@endforeach

{{ $posts->links() }} <!-- Renders pagination links -->

2. Simple Pagination (Faster for Large Data)

The paginatemethod counts the total number of records matched by the query before retrieving the records from the database. This is done so that the paginator knows how many pages of records there are in total. However, if you do not plan to show the total number of pages in your application's UI, then the record count query is unnecessary.

Therefore, if you only need to display simple "Next" and "Previous" links in your application's UI, you may use the simplePaginate method to perform a single, efficient query:

$posts = Post::simplePaginate(10); // No total count

Best for large datasets where counting all records is slow.

3. Cursor Pagination (For Infinite Scroll)

While paginate and simplePaginate create queries using the SQL "offset" clause, cursor pagination works by constructing "where" clauses that compare the values of the ordered columns contained in the query, providing the most efficient database performance available amongst all of Laravel's pagination methods. This method of pagination is particularly well-suited for large data-sets and "infinite" scrolling user interfaces.

Unlike offset based pagination, which includes a page number in the query string of the URLs generated by the paginator, cursor based pagination places a "cursor" string in the query string. The cursor is an encoded string containing the location that the next paginated query should start paginating and the direction that it should paginate:

http://localhost/users?cursor=eyJpZCI6MTUsIl9wb2ludHNUb05leHRJdGVtcyI6dHJ1ZX0

You may create a cursor based paginator instance via the cursorPaginate method offered by the query builder. This method returns an instance of Illuminate\Pagination\CursorPaginator:

$posts = Post::orderBy('created_at')->cursorPaginate(15);

Ideal for real-time feeds and infinite scroll implementations.

Customizing Laravel 11 Pagination

By default, the views rendered to display the pagination links are compatible with the Tailwind CSS framework. However, if you are not using Tailwind, you are free to define your own views to render these links. When calling the links method on a paginator instance, you may pass the view name as the first argument to the method:

{{ $paginator->links('view.name') }}

<!-- Passing additional data to the view... -->
{{ $paginator->links('view.name', ['foo' => 'bar']) }}

However, the easiest way to customize the pagination views is by exporting them to your resources/views/vendor directory using the vendor:publish command:

php artisan vendor:publish --tag=laravel-pagination

1. Custom Pagination Links

{{ $posts->links('custom.pagination') }} <!-- Uses custom view -->

2. Dynamic Pagination Per Page

// Allow users to select items per page
$perPage = request('per_page', 10);
$posts = Post::paginate($perPage);

Paginator/LengthAwarePaginator Instance Methods

Each paginator instance provides additional pagination information via the following methods:

Cursor Paginator Instance Methods

Each cursor paginator instance provides additional pagination information via the following methods:

Common Pagination Issues & Fixes

❌ Problem: Pagination links not working

✅ Fix: Ensure $items->links() is called in Blade.

❌ Problem: Duplicate content in Google

✅ Fix: Use rel="canonical" and rel="prev/next".

❌ Problem: Slow pagination on large tables

✅ Fix: Use simplePaginate() or cursorPaginate().

Conclusion

Laravel 11’s pagination system is powerful and flexible, allowing for efficient data handling while maintaining SEO best practices. By following this guide, you can implement: