Difference between string and text in rails?

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The difference relies in how the symbol is converted into its respective column type in query language.

with MySQL :string is mapped to VARCHAR(255)

  • https://edgeguides.rubyonrails.org/active_record_migrations.html
:string |                   VARCHAR                | :limit => 1 to 255 (default = 255)  
:text   | TINYTEXT, TEXT, MEDIUMTEXT, or LONGTEXT2 | :limit => 1 to 4294967296 (default = 65536)

Reference:

Working with Rails – ActiveRecord, Migrations, Models, Scaffolding, and Database Completion

When should each be used?

As a general rule of thumb, use :string for short text input (username, email, password, titles, etc.) and use :text for longer expected input such as descriptions, comment content, etc.

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