An easier way to use PHPUnit with CodeIgniter 3.x.

• You don't have to modify CodeIgniter core files at all.
• You can write controller tests easily.
• Nothing is untestable, maybe.
• Well documented.

• PHP 7.3 or later
  • If you use Monkey Patching, you must use PHP-Parser 4.2 or later as a Composer dependency.
• CodeIgniter 3.x
  • If you want to upgrade to CodeIgniter4, see #361.
• PHPUnit 9.3 or later
  • If you want to use PHPUnit 9.2 or earlier, please use ci-phpunit-test 2.x.

• NetBeans
  • Go to Project Properties > Testing > PHPUnit, check Use Custom Test Suite checkbox, and select application/tests/_ci_phpunit_test/TestSuiteProvider.php.

See Change Log.

codeigniter/
├── application/
│   └── tests/
│        ├── _ci_phpunit_test/ ... don't touch! files ci-phpunit-test uses
│        ├── Bootstrap.php     ... bootstrap file for PHPUnit
│        ├── DbTestCase.php    ... DbTestCase class
│        ├── TestCase.php      ... TestCase class
│        ├── controllers/      ... put your controller tests
│        ├── libraries/        ... put your library tests
│        ├── mocks/
│        │   └── libraries/    ... mock libraries
│        ├── models/           ... put your model tests
│        └── phpunit.xml       ... config file for PHPUnit
└── vendor/

1. Download latest ci-phpunit-test from https://github.com/kenjis/ci-phpunit-test/releases.
2. Unzip and copy application/tests folder into your application folder in CodeIgniter project.

That's it.

$ cd /path/to/codeigniter/
$ composer require kenjis/ci-phpunit-test:^3.0 --dev

And run install.php:

$ php vendor/kenjis/ci-phpunit-test/install.php --from-composer

• The above command always overwrites existing files.
• You must run it at CodeIgniter project root folder.
• You can specify your application and public folder with option arguments, if you use custom folder paths.

$ php vendor/kenjis/ci-phpunit-test/install.php -a <application_dir> -p <public_dir> -t <unittest_dir>

So the default would be:

$ php vendor/kenjis/ci-phpunit-test/install.php -a application -p public -t application/tests

• But some paths may be not correct, in that case, please fix them in tests/Bootstrap.php.

1. Download latest ci-phpunit-test from https://github.com/kenjis/ci-phpunit-test/releases.
2. Unzip and replace application/tests/_ci_phpunit_test folder.
3. Read Change Log.

$ cd /path/to/codeigniter/
$ composer update kenjis/ci-phpunit-test

Read Change Log.

If you're upgrading from a previous version of ci-phpunit-test that created an application/test/_ci_phpunit_test directory and now want to directly use ci-phpunit-test from Composer, you have a couple of additional steps:

1. Delete the old test library directory:

   $ rm -rf /path/to/codeigniter/application/tests/_ci_phpunit_test

2. Edit the application/tests/Bootstrap.php file. At the bottom of the "set the main path constants" section, add the following:

   define('CI_PHPUNIT_TESTPATH', implode(
       DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR,
       [dirname(APPPATH), 'vendor', 'kenjis', 'ci-phpunit-test', 'application', 'tests', '_ci_phpunit_test']
   ).DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR);

   And replace any references to __DIR__ . '/_ci_phpunit_test/ or TESTPATH . '_ci_phpunit_test with CI_PHPUNIT_TESTPATH . '. (So, for example, __DIR__ . '/_ci_phpunit_test/CIPHPUnitTest.php' would become CI_PHPUNIT_TESTPATH . '/CIPHPUnitTest.php'.)

You need to install PHPUnit before running tests.

If you use Composer:

$ composer require phpunit/phpunit --dev

$ cd /path/to/codeigniter/
$ vendor/bin/phpunit -c application/tests/
PHPUnit 9.5.4 by Sebastian Bergmann and contributors.

...                                                                 3 / 3 (100%)

Time: 00:00.102, Memory: 12.00 MB

OK (3 tests, 3 assertions)

Generating code coverage report in Clover XML format ... done [00:00.002]

Generating code coverage report in HTML format ... done [00:00.012]

To generate coverage report, Xdebug is needed.

If you want to run a single test case file:

$ vendor/bin/phpunit -c application/tests/ application/tests/models/Category_model_test.php

As an example, a test case class for Inventory_model would be as follows:

<?php

class Inventory_model_test extends TestCase
{
    public function setUp(): void
    {
        $this->resetInstance();
        $this->CI->load->model('Inventory_model');
        $this->obj = $this->CI->Inventory_model;
    }

    public function test_get_category_list()
    {
        $expected = [
            1 => 'Book',
            2 => 'CD',
            3 => 'DVD',
        ];
        $list = $this->obj->get_category_list();
        foreach ($list as $category) {
            $this->assertEquals($expected[$category->id], $category->name);
        }
    }

    public function test_get_category_name()
    {
        $actual = $this->obj->get_category_name(1);
        $expected = 'Book';
        $this->assertEquals($expected, $actual);
    }
}

As an example, a test case class for Welcome controller would be as follows:

<?php

class Welcome_test extends TestCase
{
    public function test_index()
    {
        $output = $this->request('GET', 'welcome/index');
        $this->assertStringContainsString(
            '<title>Welcome to CodeIgniter</title>', $output
        );
    }
}

See How to Write Tests for details.

See Function and Class Reference.

See Tips.

Some features of ci-phpunit-test are available in the following standalone packages.

• https://github.com/kenjis/phpunit-helper
• https://github.com/kenjis/monkey-patch

• CodeIgniter Test Application for ci-phpunit-test
• CodeIgniter Composer Installer
• Cli for CodeIgniter 3.0
• CodeIgniter Simple and Secure Twig
• CodeIgniter Doctrine
• CodeIgniter Deployer
• CodeIgniter3 Filename Checker
• CodeIgniter Widget (View Partial) Sample
• CodeIgniter3 Namespaced Controller