Odoo ORM Cheat Sheet for Developers

The Odoo ORM is powerful but dense. This cheat sheet condenses the most-used methods, patterns, and domain syntax into a single reference you can bookmark. Every snippet is runnable in the Odoo shell (odoo-bin shell) or inside a module method.

Environment and Recordsets

Everything in the Odoo ORM operates on recordsets — ordered collections of records of the same model, attached to an environment:

# env is available inside any model method as self.env
# Access a model
Partner = self.env['res.partner']

# env.user — current user record
# env.company — current company
# env.context — immutable dict of context values
# env.cr — raw psycopg2 cursor (use sparingly)

search — Find Records

# Basic search with a domain
partners = self.env['res.partner'].search([('is_company', '=', True)])

# With limit, offset, order
partners = self.env['res.partner'].search(
[('country_id.code', '=', 'US')],
limit=10,
offset=20,
order='name asc'
)

# Count without fetching records
count = self.env['res.partner'].search_count([('active', '=', True)])

# search_read — returns list of dicts, more efficient than search + read
rows = self.env['res.partner'].search_read(
[('is_company', '=', True)],
fields=['name', 'email', 'phone'],
limit=50
)

browse — Fetch by ID

# Single record
partner = self.env['res.partner'].browse(42)

# Multiple records (returns a recordset)
partners = self.env['res.partner'].browse([1, 2, 3])

# Check existence
if partner.exists():
print(partner.name)

create — Insert Records

# Single record
new_partner = self.env['res.partner'].create({
'name': 'Acme Corp',
'email': '[email protected]',
'is_company': True,
})

# Multiple records (Odoo 14+)
new_partners = self.env['res.partner'].create([
{'name': 'Alice', 'email': '[email protected]'},
{'name': 'Bob',   'email': '[email protected]'},
])

write — Update Records

# Update all records in a recordset at once
partners.write({'phone': '+1-800-ACME', 'active': True})

# Update a single field on one record
partner.name = 'Acme Corporation'  # triggers onchange, preferred for single records

# write() on an empty recordset is a no-op (safe)
self.env['res.partner'].browse([]).write({'name': 'x'})  # does nothing

unlink — Delete Records

# Delete all records in the recordset
old_logs = self.env['my.log'].search([('date', '<', '2024-01-01')])
old_logs.unlink()

# Always check for dependencies — Odoo raises UserError if restrict ondelete is triggered

filtered — In-Memory Filter

# Filter with a lambda
companies = partners.filtered(lambda p: p.is_company)

# Filter by field value (string shortcut)
active_partners = partners.filtered('active')

# Chain filters
us_companies = partners.filtered(
lambda p: p.is_company and p.country_id.code == 'US'
)

mapped — Extract or Transform Values

# Extract a field as a list
names = partners.mapped('name')  # ['Alice', 'Bob', ...]

# Traverse related fields
countries = partners.mapped('country_id')  # recordset of res.country

# Apply a function
totals = orders.mapped(lambda o: o.amount_total * 1.1)

sorted — Order a Recordset

# Sort by field name (ascending)
sorted_partners = partners.sorted('name')

# Descending
sorted_partners = partners.sorted('name', reverse=True)

# Sort by a lambda
sorted_orders = orders.sorted(key=lambda o: o.amount_total, reverse=True)

sudo — Bypass Access Rights

# Run as superuser (bypasses record rules and ACLs)
all_partners = self.env['res.partner'].sudo().search([])

# sudo() with a specific user
user = self.env['res.users'].browse(5)
record = self.env['sale.order'].sudo(user).browse(10)

# IMPORTANT: use sudo() sparingly — it bypasses all security checks

with_context — Pass Context Values

# Disable mail tracking for bulk writes
self.env['res.partner'].with_context(mail_notrack=True).write({'phone': '...'})

# Force a specific date for price computation
order = order.with_context(pricelist_date='2026-01-01')

# Set lang for translated field values
partner_fr = partner.with_context(lang='fr_FR')
print(partner_fr.name)  # returns French translation if available

# Pass arbitrary context to downstream methods
self.env['my.model'].with_context(my_flag=True).my_method()

Domain Syntax Reference

# Basic operators: =, !=, <, <=, >, >=, like, ilike, in, not in, child_of
[('name', 'ilike', 'acme')]          # case-insensitive contains
[('id', 'in', [1, 2, 3])]
[('partner_id', 'child_of', 7)]      # includes all children in hierarchy

# Logical operators: '&' (AND, default), '|' (OR), '!' (NOT)
# Prefix notation — operator comes before its two operands
['|', ('country_id.code', '=', 'US'), ('country_id.code', '=', 'CA')]
['&', ('is_company', '=', True), ('active', '=', True)]

# Negation
['!', ('active', '=', True)]         # same as [('active', '!=', True)]

# Nested
['|',
'&', ('is_company', '=', True), ('country_id.code', '=', 'US'),
('email', 'ilike', '@enterprise.com')
]

# Empty domain = no filter = all records
self.env['res.partner'].search([])  # returns everything (use with limit!)

Common Patterns

# Ensure singleton — raises if recordset has 0 or 2+ records
partner = partners.ensure_one()

# ids property — list of database IDs
id_list = partners.ids  # [1, 4, 7]

# Concatenate recordsets of the same model
all_partners = internal_partners | external_partners

# Intersection
shared = set_a & set_b

# Check membership
if partner in partners:
...

# _name — technical model name
print(self._name)  # 'res.partner'

Using the ORM on DeployMonkey Instances

DeployMonkey instances expose a full Odoo shell for debugging. Connect via the dashboard terminal or SSH and run:

odoo-bin shell -d your_database_name

All ORM operations above work directly in the shell — useful for one-off data fixes, debugging, or exploring data before writing a proper module. Pair with the Odoo debugging guide for a complete developer toolkit.

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