The Issue of Enums in Elixir Elixir doesn’t have a native enum construct, so we usually rely on atoms, strings, or macros to represent named constants. Observed Issues String vs Atom: Some contexts (like pattern matching or internal logic) prefer atoms, while others (like database fields or API res…

Of course for database fields Ecto does support enums . For other stuff I generally use atoms and pattern matching. I wouldn’t necessarily be opposed to a native Enum construct but pattern matching and a public constant for enumeration gets you pretty much all of the way there. I think the type syst…

Actually, one thing that does bother me is that there are a few different ways to implement constants and they all have different tradeoffs. I think this is a bit unintuitive. @my_enum [:first, :second, :third] def my_enum, do: [:first, :second, :third] defmacro my_enum, do: [:first, :second, :thir…

Exactly. Basically, if one needs a compile-time validated enum with pattern-matching, sigil is the way to go. Just accept enum elements and raise otherwise. If a custom serialization is needed, a value can be backed by a module exporting the sigil and implementations of the respective protocols.

Can anyone give an example of the enum implementation with sigils?

defmodule MyEnum do defmacro sigil_MYENUM({:<<>>, _, [value]}, [] = _modifiers) do case __CALLER__.context do :match -> if value in ~w[one two], do: value, else: raise(value) _ -> if value in ~w[one two], do: value, else: raise(value) end end end defmodule Te…

[image] apoorv-2204: I eventually prefer enums as strings for simplicity. String comparison is linear and is always slower than atom comparison [image] apoorv-2204: Some contexts (like pattern matching or internal logic) prefer atoms, while others (like database fields or API responses) …

Elixir Programming Language Forum

How do you handle enums in your codebase?

Questions & Help Questions

Schultzer October 21, 2025, 4:20pm 4

You forgot sigils