Why I changed my mind about down migrations

Why I changed my mind about down migrations

From No Compromises by Joel Clermont and Aaron Saray

January 4, 2026 · 17 min · Episode 143

About this episode

Aaron Saray discusses his change of mind regarding down migrations in software development.

Have you ever built a strong case for something, only to realize later you were solving the wrong problem? In the latest episode of the No Compromises podcast, we discuss Aaron's surprising reversal on down migrations, a topic we've publicly discussed on this podcast. We walk through the original arguments for writing down migrations and deconstruct each one. (00:00) - The original case for down migrations (03:45) - Aaron changes his stance (05:15) - Why seeders beat rollbacks for local dev (10:30) - Rethinking the production rollback scenario (14:45) - Silly bit Keep your knowledge fresh, check out Mastering Laravel .

People in this episode

Hosts: Aaron Saray, Joel Clermont

Topics covered

  • down migrations
  • software development
  • database management
  • local development
  • production rollback

Keywords

  • down migrations
  • software development
  • database rollbacks
  • local dev
  • production rollback

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: No Compromises, Mastering Laravel

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