Announcing our PHP SDKs for Vector

On January 31st, 2024, we announced the public release of Upstash Vector, our serverless vector database designed for storing and querying vector data. With Upstash Vector, you can build powerful applications like semantic search, recommendation engines, RAG, and more.

Today, we're excited to launch the official PHP SDKs for Upstash Vector, making it easier than ever to integrate vector search into your PHP applications, whether you're building a web app, CLI tool, or library.

If you're already familiar with our SDKs for JavaScript, Python, or Go, you'll feel right at home.

Upstash Vector for PHP

Upstash Vector for PHP is a generic SDK that can be integrated into any PHP application independently of the framework you're using.

You can install the SDK using Composer:

composer require upstash/vector

The following snippet shows a basic example of how to use the SDK to upsert vectors and query them.

Just remember that to use the snippet below your Index must be configured with 1536 dimensions, otherwise update the code accordingly.

use Upstash\Vector\Index;
use Upstash\Vector\VectorUpsert;
use Upstash\Vector\VectorQuery;
 
use function Upstash\Vector\createRandomVector;
 
$index = new Index(
  url: 'UPSTASH_VECTOR_REST_URL',
  token: 'UPSTASH_VECTOR_REST_TOKEN',
);
 
$index->upsertMany([
  new VectorUpsert(
    id: 'id-1',
    vector: createRandomVector(dimensions: 1536),
    metadata: ['metadata_field' => 'metadata_value1']
  ),
  new VectorUpsert(
    id: 'id-2',
    vector: createRandomVector(dimensions: 1536),
    metadata: ['metadata_field' => 'metadata_value2']
  ),
]);
 
$results = $index->query(new VectorQuery(
  vector: createRandomVector(dimensions: 1536),
  topK: 10,
));
 
// ...

We've also prepared a quick start guide for the PHP SDK, available here.

Upstash Vector for Laravel

With the growing popularity of Laravel we know that many developers would like to use Upstash Vector in their Laravel applications.

Upstash Vector for Laravel not only makes it easier to natively integrate our Vector index into your application by providing a simple Facade that you can interact with the Index but also ships with the ability to connect to multiple indexes at the same time.

You can install the SDK for Laravel using Composer:

composer require upstash/vector-laravel

Our Laravel SDK is automatically configured, and the only step required is adding the Upstash Vector environment variables to your .env file.

UPSTASH_VECTOR_REST_URL=
UPSTASH_VECTOR_REST_TOKEN=

Once you've set up the environment variables, you can start using our Vector Facade to interact with the Vector Index.

use Upstash\Vector\Laravel\Facades\Vector;
use Upstash\Vector\VectorUpsert;
use Upstash\Vector\VectorQuery;
 
use function Upstash\Vector\createRandomVector;
 
Vector::upsertMany([
  new VectorUpsert(
    id: 'id-1',
    vector: createRandomVector(dimensions: 1536),
    metadata: ['metadata_field' => 'metadata_value1']
  ),
  new VectorUpsert(
    id: 'id-2',
    vector: createRandomVector(dimensions: 1536),
    metadata: ['metadata_field' => 'metadata_value2']
  ),
]);
 
$results = Vector::query(new VectorQuery(
  vector: createRandomVector(dimensions: 1536),
  topK: 10,
));
 
// ...

What Can You Build with Upstash Vector?

With a vector database, you can power a wide range of applications, from simple similarity search to advanced recommendation systems. Whether you're enhancing search functionality, personalizing content, or building AI-driven experiences, Upstash Vector gives you the flexibility to bring your ideas to life.

To demonstrate its capabilities, we built Semantic Emoji, an open-source project that uses a dataset of emojis to power a semantic search engine with our new Laravel SDK.

Check it out on GitHub and start building!

Closing Thoughts

We live in an exciting time where the tools to build almost anything are becoming more accessible and affordable. AI continues to evolve at a rapid pace, shaping user expectations for search experiences that go beyond simple keywords to truly understand meaning. As developers, it's up to us to deliver on that promise.

Personally, I'm thrilled about this announcement—I can't wait to see what the community creates with Upstash Vector. I know I'll be shipping some wild and fun experiments myself!

So now, I ask you…

What will you build?