Short answer: you have other points with $image->user->..., if $image->user is null there it will fail. It is expected behaviour.

Here’s a simplified version of the code you shared:

@if ($image->user->image)
    

         $image->user->image]) }}" class="avatar"> 
    
@endif

I marked two important points:

• Point A passes (inside the @if check).
• Point B will throw the error if $image->user is null — and it isn’t inside any check.

There are several options how you can fix it, and the best one depends on your business logic:

Wrap the entire block

@if ($image->user)
    @if ($image->user->image)
        

             $image->user->image]) }}" class="avatar">
        
    @endif
    
... the rest of code
@endif

Use null-safe operator (Laravel 8+)

{{ $image->user?->name ?? 'Anonymous' }}

Provide default values

{{ $image->user->name ?? 'Anonymous' }}

My recommendation: Step back and handle it in the Controller with API Resources

It’s best to prepare data in your controller using Resources. This way, you avoid mixing logic into your views.

Step 1: In your controller

public function show(Image $image)
{
    return new ImageResource($image);
}

Step 2: Create the resource

php artisan make:resource ImageResource

Step 3: Add default fallbacks

class ImageResource extends JsonResource
{
    public function toArray($request)
    {
        return [
            'avatar' => $this->user?->image ?? 'default-avatar.png',
            'nick' => $this->user?->nick ?? 'Anonymous',
            'full_name' => $this->user
                ? $this->user->name . ' ' . $this->user->surname
                : 'Anonymous',
            'image_url' => route('image.file', ['filename' => $this->image_path]),
            'description' => $this->description,
            'likes_count' => $this->likes->count(),
... add other fields
        ];
    }
}

You have more than one image?

No problem with this:

public function index(Request $request)
{
    $images = Image::all(); /** Or whatever your logic is 
Image::paginate()
*/
    
    return ImageResource::collection($images);
}

Passing it to blade template?

public function show(Image $image)
{
    return view('image', [$image => new ImageResource($image)]);
}

Final tip

If $image->user is unexpectedly null, double-check:

• Whether the related user was soft deleted.
• Whether the relationship is correctly defined in your Image model.
• Whether eager loading was used (Image::with('user')->get()), to avoid lazy loading issues.