Add Prisma 2 to a NestJS Application

Get Started with NestJS and Prisma

Tutorial Goal

This tutorial goes through the creation of a basic NestJS application using Prisma 2 (herein simply known as Prisma) as an ORM. This tutorial will use a REST API but it can easily be extended to use GraphQL instead.

This tutorial will not cover NestJS basics nor Prisma basics. It will simply cover how to connect the two technologies.

Video Tutorial

If you learn better via video, watch my YouTube tutorial:

GitHub Repository

AryanJ-NYC / nestjs-with-prisma-2

NestJS with Prisma

View on GitHub

Create a new NestJS Application

yarn global add @nestjs/cli
nest new nestjs-with-prisma

Add Prisma to NestJS

yarn add @prisma/client
yarn add @prisma/cli -D

yarn prisma init

prisma init bootstraps a Prisma project within the current directory. Move /prisma to /src.

Add Movie model to /src/prisma/schema.prisma:

model Movie {
  id           Int    @default(autoincrement()) @id
  director     String
  movieName    String
  yearReleased Int
}

Create a Prisma migration.

yarn prisma migrate save --schema src/prisma/schema.prisma --experimental

Execute the Prisma migration.

yarn prisma migrate up --schema src/prisma/schema.prisma --experimental

Generate the Prisma Client based on the Movie model defined in src/prisma/schema.prisma.

yarn prisma generate --schema src/prisma/schema.prisma

Create Prisma Module + Service

nest g module prisma
nest g service prisma

In /src/prisma/prisma.service.ts:

import { Injectable } from '@nestjs/common';
import { PrismaClient } from '@prisma/client';

@Injectable()
export class PrismaService extends PrismaClient {}

Then export the PrismaService from PrismaModule (/src/prisma/prisma.module.ts):

import { Module } from '@nestjs/common';
import { PrismaService } from './prisma.service';

@Module({
  providers: [PrismaService],
  exports: [PrismaService],
})
export class PrismaModule {}

Movies Module + Controller

nest g module movies

nest g controller movies

Import the PrismaModule into our MoviesModule (in /src/movies/movies.module.ts) so we can use PrismaService:

import { Module } from '@nestjs/common';
import { MoviesController } from './movies.controller';
import { PrismaModule } from 'src/prisma/prisma.module';

@Module({
  imports: [PrismaModule],
  controllers: [MoviesController],
})
export class MoviesModule {}

Create a Movie data transfer object (src/movies/movies.dto.ts) to represent the movie object:

export class MovieDto {
  id: number;
  director: string;
  movieName: string;
  yearReleased: number;
}

In src/movies/movies.controller.ts:

import { Controller, Get, Post, Body } from '@nestjs/common';
import { PrismaService } from '../prisma/prisma.service';
import { MovieDto } from './movie.dto';

@Controller('movies')
export class MoviesController {
  constructor(private readonly prismaService: PrismaService) {}

  @Post()
  create(
    @Body() { director, movieName, yearReleased }: MovieDto,
  ): Promise<MovieDto> {
    return this.prismaService.movie.create({
      data: { director, movieName, yearReleased },
    });
  }

  @Get()
  findAll(): Promise<MovieDto[]> {
    return this.prismaService.movie.findMany();
  }
}

Test Your App

Start your application with:

yarn start:dev

Make HTTP Request to POST http://localhost:3000/movies with a body of:

{
    "director": "George Lucas",
    "movieName": "Star Wars",
    "yearReleased": 1977
}

Make HTTP request to GET http://localhost:3000/movies. Your response should be as follows:

[
  {
    "id": 1,
    "director": "George Lucas",
    "movieName": "Star Wars",
    "yearReleased": 1978
  }
]

Nice job!

Comments

[suenodesign2015]

Thank you

[JCM]

Thanks for the video.
Just one question:
why did you move prisma folder to src forlder ? (Move /prisma to /src ) ?

[Aryan J]

Good question.

I would rather have everything Prisma-related (the schema and the NestJS module) in one folder rather than separated into two folders.

There's also a bit of personal preference there with wanting to keep my root folder as clean as possible.

[Bruno Queiroz]

Simple and awesome man, thanks a lot!

[Aryan J]

Thank you, Bruno!