Laravel Fluent Query Builder Join with subquery

I think what you looking for is "joinSub". It's supported from laravel ^5.6. If you using laravel version below 5.6 you can also register it as macro in your app service provider file. like this https://github.com/teamtnt/laravel-scout-tntsearch-driver/issues/171#issuecomment-413062522

$subquery = DB::table('catch-text')
            ->select(DB::raw("user_id,MAX(created_at) as MaxDate"))
            ->groupBy('user_id');

$query = User::joinSub($subquery,'MaxDates',function($join){
          $join->on('users.id','=','MaxDates.user_id');
})->select(['users.*','MaxDates.*']);

Ok for all of you out there that arrived here in desperation searching for the same problem. I hope you will find this quicker then I did ;O.

This is how it is solved. JoostK told me at github that "the first argument to join is the table (or data) you're joining.". And he was right.

Here is the code. Different table and names but you will get the idea right? It t

DB::table('users')
        ->select('first_name', 'TotalCatches.*')

        ->join(DB::raw('(SELECT user_id, COUNT(user_id) TotalCatch,
               DATEDIFF(NOW(), MIN(created_at)) Days,
               COUNT(user_id)/DATEDIFF(NOW(), MIN(created_at))
               CatchesPerDay FROM `catch-text` GROUP BY user_id)
               TotalCatches'), 
        function($join)
        {
           $join->on('users.id', '=', 'TotalCatches.user_id');
        })
        ->orderBy('TotalCatches.CatchesPerDay', 'DESC')
        ->get();

I was looking for a solution to quite a related problem: finding the newest records per group which is a specialization of a typical greatest-n-per-group with N = 1.

The solution involves the problem you are dealing with here (i.e., how to build the query in Eloquent) so I am posting it as it might be helpful for others. It demonstrates a cleaner way of sub-query construction using powerful Eloquent fluent interface with multiple join columns and where condition inside joined sub-select.

In my example I want to fetch the newest DNS scan results (table scan_dns) per group identified by watch_id. I build the sub-query separately.

The SQL I want Eloquent to generate:

SELECT * FROM `scan_dns` AS `s`
INNER JOIN (
  SELECT x.watch_id, MAX(x.last_scan_at) as last_scan
  FROM `scan_dns` AS `x`
  WHERE `x`.`watch_id` IN (1,2,3,4,5,42)
  GROUP BY `x`.`watch_id`) AS ss
ON `s`.`watch_id` = `ss`.`watch_id` AND `s`.`last_scan_at` = `ss`.`last_scan`

I did it in the following way:

// table name of the model
$dnsTable = (new DnsResult())->getTable();

// groups to select in sub-query
$ids = collect([1,2,3,4,5,42]);

// sub-select to be joined on
$subq = DnsResult::query()
    ->select('x.watch_id')
    ->selectRaw('MAX(x.last_scan_at) as last_scan')
    ->from($dnsTable . ' AS x')
    ->whereIn('x.watch_id', $ids)
    ->groupBy('x.watch_id');
$qqSql = $subq->toSql();  // compiles to SQL

// the main query
$q = DnsResult::query()
    ->from($dnsTable . ' AS s')
    ->join(
        DB::raw('(' . $qqSql. ') AS ss'),
        function(JoinClause $join) use ($subq) {
            $join->on('s.watch_id', '=', 'ss.watch_id')
                 ->on('s.last_scan_at', '=', 'ss.last_scan')
                 ->addBinding($subq->getBindings());  
                 // bindings for sub-query WHERE added
        });

$results = $q->get();

UPDATE:

Since Laravel 5.6.17 the sub-query joins were added so there is a native way to build the query.

$latestPosts = DB::table('posts')
                   ->select('user_id', DB::raw('MAX(created_at) as last_post_created_at'))
                   ->where('is_published', true)
                   ->groupBy('user_id');

$users = DB::table('users')
        ->joinSub($latestPosts, 'latest_posts', function ($join) {
            $join->on('users.id', '=', 'latest_posts.user_id');
        })->get();