I just came across an example that put the validation inside of a model like so:

class User extends Eloquent {
  protected $table = 'users';

  private $rules = array(
    'email' => 'required|email',
    'username' => 'required|min:6'
  );
 
  public function validate($input) {
    return Validator::make($input, $this->rules);
  }
}

I like how the rules are stored in there and it could even be improved by creating some kind of BaseClass for the models and put the validation function in there. However to use it this way we need to instantiate the User object first.

$user = new User();
$input = array();
$input['email'] = 'racerx@example.com';
$input['username'] = 'Short';

$valid = $user->validate($input);

if ($valid->passes()) {
  echo 'Everything is Valid!';
} else {
  var_dump($valid->messages());
}

As you can see if the validation fails it would be a waste to create the User object. Is this a big issue? I like the idea of having all the validation info in my models, keeps things cleaner is creating that User object negligible enough for the cleaner design with the validation in the models?