Beacon Metrics

Simple metrics and trends for Laravel

Installation

composer require beacon-hq/metrics

Features

• PostgreSQL, MySQL, and SQLite support
• Simple value metrics (e.g. count for a month)
• Previous period comparison (e.g. count for this month and last month)
• Trends data (e.g. count per day)
• Grouping

Supported Aggregates

• count
• sum
• average
• min
• max

Supported Intervals

• Second
• Minute
• Hour
• Day
• Week
• Month
• Year

Usage

Value Metrics

Value metrics are simple single aggregate values and will typically result in a single value.

Value metrics can be calcuted using Metrics->value().

use Carbon\Carbon;
use Beacon\Metrics\Metrics;

$value = Metrics::query(MyModel::query())
    ->count()
    ->between(now()->subMonth(1), now())
    ->value(); // 123

You can also get value metrics by group which will result in a Laravel Collection of values keys using the group value.

To enable grouping, use Metrics->byGroup(), passing in a column name or a SQL expression (i.e. DB::raw()):

use Carbon\Carbon;
use Beacon\Metrics\Metrics;

$value = Metrics::query(MyModel::query())
    ->count()
    ->groupBy('category')
    ->between(now()->subMonth(1), now())
    ->value(); // ['category1' => 123, 'category2' => 456]

With Previous

A common need is to get the metrics for the current period (e.g. today, this week) and the previous period (e.g. yesterday, last week), this can be achieved using the Metric->valueWithPrevious() method. This will return a Laravel collection.

use Carbon\Carbon;
use Beacon\Metrics\Metrics;

$value = Metrics::query(MyModel::query())
    ->count()
    ->between(now()->subMonth(1), now())
    ->valueWithPrevious();
    /*
     * [
     *   'value' => 100,
     *   'previous' => [
     *       'type' => 'increase',
     *       'value' => 80,
     *       'difference' => 20,
     *       'percentage' => 20,
     *   ],
     * ]
     */

Trend Metrics

Trends metrics allow you to get metrics for intervals of a time period, e.g. every day, every month, or multiples of an interval, e.g. every third day, every second month.

To set the period, use Metrics->by*($count), e.g. every third day would use $metrics->byDay(3).

Trends will always return a collection, with three keys:

• labels: the sorted list of labels, using the formatted date as the label value
• data: the corresponding list of values
• total: the aggregate total for the entire result set

use Carbon\Carbon;
use Beacon\Metrics\Metrics;

$value = Metrics::query(MyModel::query())
    ->count()
    ->byDay()
    ->between(now()->subWeek(), now())
    ->trends(); 
    /*
     * [
     *  'labels' => [
     *      '2025-04-07', 
     *      '2025-04-08', 
     *      '2025-04-10'
     *  ], 
     *  'data' => [
     *      3, 
     *      6, 
     *      9
     *  ], 
     *  'total' => 18
     * ]
     */

Fill Missing Values

By default, only dates with results will be returned. To fill in missing values, use Metrics->fillMissing():

use Carbon\Carbon;
use Beacon\Metrics\Metrics;

$value = Metrics::query(MyModel::query())
    ->count()
    ->byDay()
    ->between(now()->subWeek(), now())
    ->trends();
    /*
     * [
     *  'labels' => [
     *      '2025-04-05', 
     *      '2025-04-06', 
     *      '2025-04-07', 
     *      '2025-04-08', 
     *      '2025-04-09',
     *      '2025-04-10',
     *      '2025-04-11',
     *  ], 
     *  'data' => [
     *      0,
     *      0,
     *      3, 
     *      6, 
     *      0,
     *      9,
     *      0
     *  ], 
     *  'total' => 18
     * ]
     */

Percentage Values

To get results in percentages rather than absolute values, set the $inPercent argument to true when calling Metrics->trends().

Percentages are returned as a float with up to 2 decimal places.

Custom Queries

If you want metrics for a sub-set of data (e.g. a single category), you can simply add a where clause to the query passed to the Metrics::query() method.

use Beacon\Metrics\Metrics;
use App\Models\MyModel;
 
$query = MyModel::query()->where('category', 'Category Name');;

$value = Metrics::query($builder)
    ->count()
    ->between(now()->subMonth(1), now())
    ->value(); // 123

Indexes

For performance, you need to have appropriate indexes on your tables. The following are recommendations based on testing, but you should always test with your own data to confirm.

If you are querying without a where clause, for MySQL/MariaDB and SQLite you should have an index on the date column (e.g. created_at):

Schema::table('your_table', function (Blueprint $table) {
    $table->index('created_at');
});

For PostgreSQL, you should have an index on the date column (e.g. created_at) and the value column:

Schema::table('your_table', function (Blueprint $table) {
    $table->index(['created_at', 'value']);
});

If you are querying with a where clause, you should also include the where column:

Warning

The ordering in the column matters! Your where column should be first.

Schema::table('your_table', function (Blueprint $table) {
    $table->index(['your_column', 'created_at']); // MySQL/MariaDB and SQLite
    $table->index(['your_column', 'created_at', 'value']); // PostgreSQL
});

Defaults

Aggregate

By default, the package will use the count aggregate. If you want to use a different aggregate, you can use the appropriate aggregate method:

• Metrics->count()
• Metrics->sum()
• Metrics->average()
• Metrics->min()
• Metrics->max()

Interval

By default, the package will use a one day interval. If you want to use a different interval, you can use the Metrics->by*() methods to set the interval:

• Metrics->bySecond($count)
• Metrics->byMinute($count)
• Metrics->byHour($count)
• Metrics->byDay($count)
• Metrics->byWeek($count)
• Metrics->byMonth($count)
• Metrics->byYear($count)

Date Column

By default, the package will use the created_at column for the date column. If you want to use a different column, you can use the Metrics->dateColumn() method to set the column name.

use Carbon\Carbon;
use Beacon\Metrics\Metrics;

$value = Metrics::query(MyModel::query())
    ->dateColumn('updated_at')
    ->count()
    ->between(now()->subMonth(1), now())
    ->value(); // 123

Date Range

By default, the package will use the previous month as the date range. If you want to use a different date range, you can use the Metrics->between(), Metrics->from(), or any of the Metrics->for*() methods to set the date range.