Databases
Stateless services are simple and scalable, but most complex services eventually end up needing persistent state. Fortunately, you can store state in a fully managed PostgreSQL database on Render.
PostgreSQL is a powerful, open-source, object-relational database management system used globally by some of the world’s best technology companies. Render’s managed PostgreSQL offering makes it easy to use PostgreSQL in a secure, reliable, and completely hands-off way. Your database comes with encryption at rest, automated backups, and expandable SSD storage.
Getting Started
We have some examples backed by PostgreSQL to get you started:
Creating a Database
You can create a PostgreSQL database on Render in under a minute. Like web services, you can give your database a memorable name (which you can change at any time).
Connecting to Your Database
How you connect to your database depends on your code: some frameworks expect a single connection string or URL in an environment variable, while others need multiple connection parameters in a configuration file. See Getting Started for examples.
At a minimum, your app will need to know your database’s hostname, port, username, password, and database name (e.g. mydb in the official tutorial).
The hostname will differ depending on where you’re connecting from. For services deployed on Render, you should always use the internal connection parameters shown below. This minimizes network latency and maximizes app performance.
You can have up to 97 simultaneous connections to your database.
Connecting From Apps on Render
Using internal connection values is the recommended way for your apps to connect to your Render database. The hostname, username, database, and password are displayed on the database page:
An internal connection string that looks like postgres://USER:PASSWORD@HOST:PORT/DATABASE is also available if needed. Many database frameworks allow (or require) a connection string instead of individual connection parameters.
Connecting From Outside Render
You might want to run ad-hoc queries or migrations against your database from machines outside Render. In these cases you can connect to your database using the external connection string on the database page.
Most database clients understand the external connection string, which (like the internal connection string) looks like postgres://USER:NAME@HOST:PORT/DATABASE. We also provide the PSQL command to connect to your database which can be copied and run in the terminal as is.
Connecting from outside of Render will result in decreased performance as compared to connecting from within Render, so you should always prefer to use the internal connection values where possible.
Access Control
New databases are accessible to any IP address with the right credentials. You can remove the default rule and add your own IP addresses or even disable all external access by removing all the rules in the data access section of your database page.
The rules apply to connections from outside Render’s network. Services within the same team or account can always use the internal connection string to access their databases.
Backups
No database is completely safe from data loss. This is why we take complete database backups every day and retain all backups for at least 7 days.
We take two kinds of snapshots: a SQL-based backup and a filesystem backup. SQL backups are enough for most purposes and can be restored using psql. You can find and download all backups on your database page in the dashboard.
Manual backups for databases on the Standard plan and above can be triggered at any time from the dashboard. On the backups tab, simply click “Trigger Backup” to initiate a database backup. Please note that backups can take a while to complete, especially for larger databases. You can only trigger a manual backup if another backup isn’t already in progress.
To recover your database from a backup, download the required .sql.gz file from the Backups tab.
# first unzip the backup file
$ gzip -d $backup_file
# then restore this backup to your database using its external connection string available in the dashboard.
$ psql $external_connection_string -f $backup_fileWe’re also happy to help with restores and disaster recovery. Just contact us on Render Community or email us at support@render.com.
Disk Space
We offer database plans ranging from 1 GB to 256 GB of storage. We can always work with you to provide a custom plan; just email us at support@render.com.
Database Versions & Upgrades
The major version for your database is fixed when it is created. We don’t do major database version upgrades without your permission, because it can be unsafe to do so.
All new databases are created with PostgreSQL version 11.
We will periodically upgrade the minor version of your databases to apply the latest security fixes. For any maintenance periods that require downtime, we email you ahead of time and allow you to schedule when the maintenance should happen. We also allow you to run the maintenance yourself.
Read Replicas
A read replica is a database instance that only allows read-only connections. As you write to your primary database, Render automatically replicates your data to your read replica. Read replicas reduce load on your primary database and make one-off queries safer. They are also a great option for data analysis tools that do not need to write to your primary database, or for running computationally expensive data analysis without impacting the performance of you primary instance.
Read replicas are available to all databases using the Standard plan and above. At this time we allow you to provision a single read replica per database, which will match the plan of your primary database.
Creating a read replica
You can add a read replica to an existing database in one click from the Render dashboard. Simply navigate to your database and click “Add Read Replica”.
Once you add a read replica, we’ll begin copying over any existing data from your primary database. Read replica creation should take no more than a few minutes. Please email us if it takes longer.
After your read replica moves into an “Available” state, you can connect to it just as you would your primary database, using either the internal or external connection string.
Read Replica Performance
Data written to your primary instance will be available on your read replica after a momentary delay, making read replicas ideal for applications that don’t require instant access to new data. The specific lag between data being written to the primary and being available on the replica will depend on your database usage and can be monitored in your database metrics.
Read Replicas vs. High Availability
Read replicas are distinct from highly-available databases, with different benefits. Read replicas allow you to decrease load on your primary instance, and are safer to use for ad hoc or expensive queries. In contrast, a highly available database setup helps reduce downtime in the event of database failure.
With a high availability setup, data is still copied to a replica; if the primary instance fails, the replica is typically ‘promoted’ to become the new primary. Render does not currently support promoting a read replica to a primary, and we do not automatically fail over to your read replica on primary instance failure. We plan to introduce highly-available database options soon.
Deleting Databases
If you decide to delete a database, we do not retain backups or snapshots of your data. Make sure to download a backup before deletion.
PostgreSQL Extensions
The following extensions are enabled on all PostgreSQL databases by default.
postgis) create additional schemas (like topology) and tables (like spatial_ref_sys).
- bloom
- btree_gin
- btree_gist
- citext
- cube
- dblink
- dict_int
- dict_xsyn
- earthdistance
- fuzzystrmatch
- hstore
- intagg
- intarray
- isn
- lo
- ltree
- pg_buffercache
- pg_prewarm
- pg_stat_statements
- pg_trgm
- pgcrypto
- pgrowlocks
- pgstattuple
- postgis
- postgis_tiger_geocoder
- postgis_topology
- tablefunc
- unaccent
- uuid-ossp
If you don’t need an extension and would like to drop it, feel free to email us and we’d be happy to delete it for you. We’re working on enabling users to add and drop extensions on their own.