Drizzle Kit Has a Free Migration Tool That Generates SQL From TypeScript — No More Manual Migrations

The Migration Problem

You change a column in your ORM model. Now you need to write a migration file. By hand. In raw SQL. And hope it matches what you changed in TypeScript.

Drizzle Kit reads your TypeScript schema and generates migrations automatically.

What Drizzle Kit Gives You

Schema as Code

import { pgTable, serial, text, integer, timestamp } from 'drizzle-orm/pg-core';

export const users = pgTable('users', {
  id: serial('id').primaryKey(),
  name: text('name').notNull(),
  email: text('email').notNull().unique(),
  age: integer('age'),
  createdAt: timestamp('created_at').defaultNow(),
});

export const posts = pgTable('posts', {
  id: serial('id').primaryKey(),
  title: text('title').notNull(),
  content: text('content'),
  authorId: integer('author_id').references(() => users.id),
});

Auto-Generate Migrations

npx drizzle-kit generate

Output: 0001_create_users_and_posts.sql

CREATE TABLE users (
  id SERIAL PRIMARY KEY,
  name TEXT NOT NULL,
  email TEXT NOT NULL UNIQUE,
  age INTEGER,
  created_at TIMESTAMP DEFAULT NOW()
);

CREATE TABLE posts (
  id SERIAL PRIMARY KEY,
  title TEXT NOT NULL,
  content TEXT,
  author_id INTEGER REFERENCES users(id)
);

Schema Changes → Diffs

Add a column to your schema:

export const users = pgTable('users', {
  // ... existing columns
  role: text('role').default('user'),  // NEW
});

npx drizzle-kit generate

Output: 0002_add_role_to_users.sql

ALTER TABLE users ADD COLUMN role TEXT DEFAULT 'user';

Apply Migrations

npx drizzle-kit migrate

Drizzle Studio — Visual Database Browser

npx drizzle-kit studio

Opens a local web UI to browse your database, edit rows, and test queries. No pgAdmin needed.

Push (No Migration Files)

npx drizzle-kit push

For prototyping: pushes schema changes directly to the database without generating migration files.

Supports All Major Databases

• PostgreSQL (pg, Neon, Supabase, Vercel Postgres)
• MySQL (mysql2, PlanetScale)
• SQLite (better-sqlite3, Turso, Cloudflare D1)

Why This Matters

Migrations should be generated, not handwritten. Drizzle Kit turns your TypeScript schema into the single source of truth for both your code AND your database.

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