Using factory_girl in Rails with associations that have unique constraints. Getting duplicate errors

Just FYI, you can also use the initialize_with macro inside your factory and check to see if the object already exists, then don’t create it over again. The solution using a lambda (its awesome, but!) is replicating logic already present in find_or_create_by. This also works for associations where the :league is being created through an associated factory.

FactoryGirl.define do
  factory :league, :aliases => [:euro_cup] do
    id 1
    name "European Championship"
    rank 30
    initialize_with { League.find_or_create_by_id(id)}
  end
end