What causes "Authentication user provider [{$driver}] is not defined." in laravel/framework?

Set the provider's driver to 'eloquent' (with a 'model') or 'database' (with a 'table').

laravel/framework · error · InvalidArgumentException

Authentication user provider

Error message

Authentication user provider [{$driver}] is not defined.

What it means

Thrown by CreatesUserProviders::createUserProvider() when the provider's 'driver' is neither 'database' nor 'eloquent' and no custom provider creator has been registered via Auth::provider(). User providers are the backends that retrieve user records (Eloquent model, DB query builder, etc.).

Solutions

Set the provider's driver to 'eloquent' (with a 'model') or 'database' (with a 'table').
Register the custom provider via Auth::provider('mydriver', fn ($app, $config) => new MyUserProvider(...)) before it is resolved.
Verify the guard's 'provider' key matches an entry under 'providers' in auth.php.
Run php artisan config:clear to drop a stale cached config.

Example fix

// before
'providers' => [
    'users' => ['driver' => 'mydriver', 'model' => User::class], // not registered
],

// after — register in AuthServiceProvider::boot()
Auth::provider('mydriver', function ($app, array $config) {
    return new MyUserProvider($app['hash'], $config['model']);
});
// or switch to a built-in driver:
'providers' => [
    'users' => ['driver' => 'eloquent', 'model' => User::class],
],

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

// PHP — verify the provider driver before resolving
$providerKey = config('auth.guards.web.provider');
$providerCfg = config("auth.providers.{$providerKey}");
$driver = $providerCfg['driver'] ?? null;
$ok = in_array($driver, ['eloquent','database'], true) || app()->bound("auth.provider.creator.{$driver}");
if (! $ok) abort(500, "User provider driver [{$driver}] is not defined.");

Type guard

function providerDriverIsRegistered(?string $driver): bool {
    return in_array($driver, ['eloquent','database'], true);
}

Try / catch

try {
    Auth::createUserProvider($provider);
} catch (\InvalidArgumentException $e) {
    report('Unknown user provider driver: '.$e->getMessage());
    throw $e;
}

Prevention

Use 'eloquent' or 'database' providers unless a custom one is registered.
Register custom providers via Auth::provider() before resolution.
Clear config cache after editing auth.php.

When it happens

Trigger: Configuring a guard's 'provider' to a key whose entry in config/auth.php 'providers' uses an unknown 'driver'; referencing a custom provider driver before calling Auth::provider($driver, $callback).

Common situations: Typo in provider driver ('eloquen'); removing a package that registered a custom user provider; config cache from before a custom provider was registered in a service provider; pointing a guard at a provider that was deleted from auth.php.

Understand the failure class

Authentication and authorization failures — expired tokens, bad credentials, and missing scopes.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of laravel/framework@e0f6eb3518 (2026-08-11). Data as JSON: /api/errors/bea9b9c431f53876. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at src/Illuminate/Auth/CreatesUserProviders.php:39

     *
     * @throws \InvalidArgumentException
     */
    public function createUserProvider($provider = null)
    {
        if (is_null($config = $this->getProviderConfiguration($provider))) {
            return;
        }

        if (isset($this->customProviderCreators[$driver = ($config['driver'] ?? null)])) {
            return call_user_func(
                $this->customProviderCreators[$driver], $this->app, $config
            );
        }

        return match ($driver) {
            'database' => $this->createDatabaseProvider($config),
            'eloquent' => $this->createEloquentProvider($config),
            default => throw new InvalidArgumentException(
                "Authentication user provider [{$driver}] is not defined."
            ),
        };
    }

    /**
     * Get the user provider configuration.
     *
     * @param  string|null  $provider
     * @return array|null
     */
    protected function getProviderConfiguration($provider)
    {
        if ($provider = $provider ?: $this->getDefaultUserProvider()) {
            return $this->app['config']['auth.providers.'.$provider];
        }
    }

View on GitHub (pinned to e0f6eb3518)