Manticore Speaks MySQL, So Here's a Laravel Database Driver for It
A Laravel database driver turns Manticore Search's MySQL wire protocol into full Eloquent support, including migrations and native KNN vector search.
Because Manticore Search accepts MySQL wire-protocol connections on port 9306, a developer built laravel-manticore-eloquent — a Laravel database driver that plugs Manticore in as a first-class Eloquent connection rather than wrapping it in a search client or relying on Scout's minimal search() API. By implementing a custom Connection and Grammar, the package inherits the entire Eloquent stack: models, migrations, pagination, chunking and casts all work against Manticore out of the box.
The driver supports ManticoreModel for indexes that live entirely in Manticore, and a HasManticore trait for hybrid models that also query a relational database. Migrations map Laravel column types to Manticore's schema, including full-text, MVA, and vector columns for native KNN search, with query-builder helpers for facets, highlighting, and full-document replace(). Documented seams include no transactions, restricted JOINs, and Manticore-managed id columns.
Already running in production at EricaPRO for a compliance name-screening service, the driver targets PHP 8.1+ and Laravel 10/11/12, with 95% test coverage enforced in CI. It's aimed at teams who want Manticore treated as a real Eloquent connection rather than a bolted-on search client.