Postgres

Features

Feature	Supported	Notes
Full Refresh Sync	Yes
Incremental - Append Sync	Yes
Replicating Views	Yes
Replicate Incremental Deletes	Yes
Logical Replication (WAL)	Yes
SSL Support	Yes
SSH Tunnel Connection	Yes
Namespaces	Yes	Enabled by default.
Custom Types	Yes
Arrays	Yes	Byte-arrays are not supported yet.
Generating an RSA Private Key	No	Coming Soon.
Schema Selection	Yes	The 'public' schema is set by default. Multiple schemas may be used at one time. No schemas set explicitly - will sync all of existing.

The Postgres source does not alter the schema present in your database. Depending on the destination connected to this source, however, the schema may be altered. See the destination's documentation for more details.

Getting Started (Airbyte Cloud)

On Airbyte Cloud, only TLS connections to your Postgres instance are supported. Other than that, you can proceed with the open-source instructions below.

Getting Started (Airbyte Open-Source)

Requirements

Postgres v9.3.x or above
Allow connections from Airbyte to your Postgres database (if they exist in separate VPCs)
Create a dedicated read-only Airbyte user with access to all tables needed for replication

1. Make sure your database is accessible from the machine running Airbyte

This is dependent on your networking setup. The easiest way to verify if Airbyte is able to connect to your Postgres instance is via the check connection tool in the UI.

2. Create a dedicated read-only user with access to the relevant tables (Recommended but optional)

This step is optional but highly recommended to allow for better permission control and auditing. Alternatively, you can use Airbyte with an existing user in your database.

To create a dedicated database user, run the following commands against your database:

CREATE USER airbyte PASSWORD 'your_password_here';

Then give it access to the relevant schema:

GRANT USAGE ON SCHEMA <schema_name> TO airbyte

Note that to replicate data from multiple Postgres schemas, you can re-run the command above to grant access to all the relevant schemas, but you'll need to set up multiple sources connecting to the same db on multiple schemas.

Next, grant the user read-only access to the relevant tables. The simplest way is to grant read access to all tables in the schema as follows:

GRANT SELECT ON ALL TABLES IN SCHEMA <schema_name> TO airbyte;

# Allow airbyte user to see tables created in the future
ALTER DEFAULT PRIVILEGES IN SCHEMA <schema_name> GRANT SELECT ON TABLES TO airbyte;

3. Optionally, set up CDC. Follow the guide below to do so.

4. That's it!

Your database user should now be ready for use with Airbyte.

Change Data Capture (CDC) / Logical Replication / WAL Replication

We use logical replication of the Postgres write-ahead log (WAL) to incrementally capture deletes using a replication plugin.

We use pgoutput as a default plugin, which is included in Postgres 10+. Also wal2json plugin is supported, please read the section on replication plugins below for more information.

Please read the CDC docs for an overview of how Airbyte approaches CDC.

Should I use CDC for Postgres?

If you need a record of deletions and can accept the limitations posted below, you should to use CDC for Postgres.
If your data set is small and you just want snapshot of your table in the destination, consider using Full Refresh replication for your table instead of CDC.
If the limitations prevent you from using CDC and your goal is to maintain a snapshot of your table in the destination, consider using non-CDC incremental and occasionally reset the data and re-sync.
If your table has a primary key but doesn't have a reasonable cursor field for incremental syncing (i.e. updated_at), CDC allows you to sync your table incrementally.

CDC Limitations

Make sure to read our CDC docs to see limitations that impact all databases using CDC replication.
CDC is only available for Postgres 10+.
Airbyte requires a replication slot configured only for its use. Only one source should be configured that uses this replication slot. Instructions on how to set up a replication slot can be found below.
Log-based replication only works for master instances of Postgres.
Using logical replication increases disk space used on the database server. The additional data is stored until it is consumed.
- We recommend setting frequent syncs for CDC in order to ensure that this data doesn't fill up your disk space.
- If you stop syncing a CDC-configured Postgres instance to Airbyte, you should delete the replication slot. Otherwise, it may fill up your disk space.
Our CDC implementation uses at least once delivery for all change records.

Setting up CDC for Postgres

1. Enable logical replication

Follow one of these guides to enable logical replication:

Bare Metal, VMs (EC2/GCE/etc), Docker, etc.
AWS Postgres RDS or Aurora
Azure Database for Postgres

2. Add user-level permissions

We recommend using a user specifically for Airbyte's replication so you can minimize access. This Airbyte user for your instance needs to be granted REPLICATION and LOGIN permissions. You can create a role with CREATE ROLE <name> REPLICATION LOGIN; and grant that role to the user. You still need to make sure the user can connect to the database, use the schema, and to use SELECT on tables (the same are required for non-CDC incremental syncs and all full refreshes).

3. Select replication plugin

We recommend using a pgoutput plugin as it is the standard logical decoding plugin in Postgres. In case the replication table contains a lot of big JSON blobs and table size exceeds 1 GB, we recommend using a wal2json instead. Please note that wal2json may require additional installation for Bare Metal, VMs (EC2/GCE/etc), Docker, etc. For more information read wal2json documentation.

4. Create replication slot

Next, you will need to create a replication slot. Here is the query used to create a replication slot called airbyte_slot:

SELECT pg_create_logical_replication_slot('airbyte_slot', 'pgoutput');

If you would like to use wal2json plugin, please change pgoutput to wal2json value in the above query.

5. Create publications and replication identities for tables

For each table you want to replicate with CDC, you should add the replication identity (the method of distinguishing between rows) first. We recommend using ALTER TABLE tbl1 REPLICA IDENTITY DEFAULT; to use primary keys to distinguish between rows. After setting the replication identity, you will need to run CREATE PUBLICATION airbyte_publication FOR TABLE <tbl1, tbl2, tbl3>;. This publication name is customizable. You must add the replication identity before creating the publication. Otherwise, ALTER/UPDATE/DELETE statements may fail if Postgres cannot determine how to uniquely identify rows. Please refer to the Postgres docs if you need to add or remove tables from your publication in the future.

The UI currently allows selecting any tables for CDC. If a table is selected that is not part of the publication, it will not replicate even though it is selected. If a table is part of the publication but does not have a replication identity, that replication identity will be created automatically on the first run if the Airbyte user has the necessary permissions.

6. Start syncing

When configuring the source, select CDC and provide the replication slot and publication you just created. You should be ready to sync data with CDC!

CDC on Bare Metal, VMs (EC2/GCE/etc), Docker, etc.

Some settings must be configured in the postgresql.conf file for your database. You can find the location of this file using psql -U postgres -c 'SHOW config_file' withe the correct psql credentials specified. Alternatively, a custom file can be specified when running postgres with the -c flag. For example postgres -c config_file=/etc/postgresql/postgresql.conf runs Postgres with the config file at /etc/postgresql/postgresql.conf.

If you are syncing data from a server using the postgres Docker image, you will need to mount a file and change the command to run Postgres with the set config file. If you're just testing CDC behavior, you may want to use a modified version of a sample postgresql.conf.

wal_level is the type of coding used within the Postgres write-ahead log. This must be set to logical for Airbyte CDC.
max_wal_senders is the maximum number of processes used for handling WAL changes. This must be at least one.
max_replication_slots is the maximum number of replication slots that are allowed to stream WAL changes. This must one if Airbyte will be the only service reading subscribing to WAL changes or more if other services are also reading from the WAL.

Here is what these settings would look like in postgresql.conf:

wal_level = logical             
max_wal_senders = 1             
max_replication_slots = 1

After setting these values you will need to restart your instance.

Finally, follow the rest of steps above.

CDC on AWS Postgres RDS or Aurora

Go to the Configuration tab for your DB cluster.
Find your cluster parameter group. You will either edit the parameters for this group or create a copy of this parameter group to edit. If you create a copy you will need to change your cluster's parameter group before restarting.
Within the parameter group page, search for rds.logical_replication. Select this row and click on the Edit parameters button. Set this value to 1.
Wait for a maintenance window to automatically restart the instance or restart it manually.
Finally, follow the rest of steps above.

CDC on Azure Database for Postgres

Use either the Azure CLI to:

az postgres server configuration set --resource-group group --server-name server --name azure.replication_support --value logical
az postgres server restart --resource-group group --name server

Finally, follow the rest of steps above.

Connection via SSH Tunnel

Airbyte has the ability to connect to a Postgres instance via an SSH Tunnel. The reason you might want to do this because it is not possible (or against security policy) to connect to the database directly (e.g. it does not have a public IP address).

When using an SSH tunnel, you are configuring Airbyte to connect to an intermediate server (a.k.a. a bastion sever) that does have direct access to the database. Airbyte connects to the bastion and then asks the bastion to connect directly to the server.

Using this feature requires additional configuration, when creating the source. We will talk through what each piece of configuration means.

Configure all fields for the source as you normally would, except SSH Tunnel Method.
SSH Tunnel Method defaults to No Tunnel (meaning a direct connection). If you want to use an SSH Tunnel choose SSH Key Authentication or Password Authentication.
1. Choose Key Authentication if you will be using an RSA Private as your secrets for establishing the SSH Tunnel (see below for more information on generating this key).
2. Choose Password Authentication if you will be using a password as your secret for establishing the SSH Tunnel.
SSH Tunnel Jump Server Host refers to the intermediate (bastion) server that Airbyte will connect to. This should be a hostname or an IP Address.
SSH Connection Port is the port on the bastion server with which to make the SSH connection. The default port for SSH connections is 22, so unless you have explicitly changed something, go with the default.
SSH Login Username is the username that Airbyte should use when connection to the bastion server. This is NOT the Postgres username.
If you are using Password Authentication, then SSH Login Username should be set to the password of the User from the previous step. If you are using SSH Key Authentication leave this blank. Again, this is not the Postgres password, but the password for the OS-user that Airbyte is using to perform commands on the bastion.
If you are using SSH Key Authentication, then SSH Private Key should be set to the RSA Private Key that you are using to create the SSH connection. This should be the full contents of the key file starting with -----BEGIN RSA PRIVATE KEY----- and ending with -----END RSA PRIVATE KEY-----.

Generating an RSA Private Key

The connector expects an RSA key in PEM format. To generate this key:

ssh-keygen -t rsa -m PEM -f myuser_rsa

This produces the private key in pem format, and the public key remains in the standard format used by the authorized_keys file on your bastion host. The public key should be added to your bastion host to whichever user you want to use with Airbyte. The private key is provided via copy-and-paste to the Airbyte connector configuration screen, so it may log in to the bastion.

Data type mapping

According to Postgres documentation, Postgres data types are mapped to the following data types when synchronizing data. You can check the test values examples here. If you can't find the data type you are looking for or have any problems feel free to add a new test!

Postgres Type	Resulting Type	Notes
`bigint`	number
`bigserial`, `serial8`	number
`bit`	string	Fixed-length bit string (e.g. "0100").
`bit varying`, `varbit`	string	Variable-length bit string (e.g. "0100").
`boolean`, `bool`	boolean
`box`	string
`bytea`	string	Variable length binary string with hex output format prefixed with "\x" (e.g. "\x6b707a").
`character`, `char`	string
`character varying`, `varchar`	string
`cidr`	string
`circle`	string
`date`	string	Parsed as ISO8601 date time at midnight. Does not support B.C. dates. Issue: #8903.
`double precision`, `float`, `float8`	number	`Infinity`, `-Infinity`, and `NaN` are not supported and converted to `null`. Issue: #8902.
`inet`	string
`integer`, `int`, `int4`	number
`interval`	string
`json`	string
`jsonb`	string
`line`	string
`lseg`	string
`macaddr`	string
`macaddr8`	string
`money`	number
`numeric`, `decimal`	number	`Infinity`, `-Infinity`, and `NaN` are not supported and converted to `null`. Issue: #8902.
`path`	string
`pg_lsn`	string
`point`	string
`polygon`	string
`real`, `float4`	number
`smallint`, `int2`	number
`smallserial`, `serial2`	number
`serial`, `serial4`	number
`text`	string
`time`	string
`timetz`	string
`timestamp`	string
`timestamptz`	string
`tsquery`	string	Not supported with CDC node. Parsed value is null. Issue: #7911
`tsvector`	string
`uuid`	string
`xml`	string
`enum`	string
`tsrange`	string
`array`	array	E.g. "["10001","10002","10003","10004"]".
composite type	string

Changelog

Version	Date	Pull Request	Subject
0.4.2	2022-01-13	9360	Added schema selection
0.4.1	2022-01-05	9116	Added materialized views processing
0.4.0	2021-12-13	8726	Support all Postgres types
0.3.17	2021-12-01	8371	Fixed incorrect handling "\n" in ssh key
0.3.16	2021-11-28	7995	Fixed money type with amount > 1000
0.3.15	2021-11-26	8066	Fixed the case, when Views are not listed during schema discovery
0.3.14	2021-11-17	8010	Added checking of privileges before table internal discovery
0.3.13	2021-10-26	7339	Support or improve support for Interval, Money, Date, various geometric data types, inventory_items, and others
0.3.12	2021-09-30	6585	Improved SSH Tunnel key generation steps
0.3.11	2021-09-02	5742	Add SSH Tunnel support
0.3.9	2021-08-17	5304	Fix CDC OOM issue
0.3.8	2021-08-13	4699	Added json config validator
0.3.4	2021-06-09	3973	Add `AIRBYTE_ENTRYPOINT` for Kubernetes support
0.3.3	2021-06-08	3960	Add method field in specification parameters
0.3.2	2021-05-26	3179	Remove `isCDC` logging
0.3.1	2021-04-21	2878	Set defined cursor for CDC
0.3.0	2021-04-21	2990	Support namespaces
0.2.7	2021-04-16	2923	SSL spec as optional
0.2.6	2021-04-16	2757	Support SSL connection
0.2.5	2021-04-12	2859	CDC bugfix
0.2.4	2021-04-09	2548	Support CDC
0.2.3	2021-03-28	2600	Add NCHAR and NVCHAR support to DB and cursor type casting
0.2.2	2021-03-26	2460	Destination supports destination sync mode
0.2.1	2021-03-18	2488	Sources support primary keys
0.2.0	2021-03-09	2238	Protocol allows future/unknown properties
0.1.13	2021-02-02	1887	Migrate AbstractJdbcSource to use iterators
0.1.12	2021-01-25	1746	Fix NPE in State Decorator
0.1.11	2021-01-25	1765	Add field titles to specification
0.1.10	2021-01-19	1724	Fix JdbcSource handling of tables with same names in different schemas
0.1.9	2021-01-14	1655	Fix JdbcSource OOM
0.1.8	2021-01-13	1588	Handle invalid numeric values in JDBC source
0.1.7	2021-01-08	1307	Migrate Postgres and MySql to use new JdbcSource
0.1.6	2020-12-09	1172	Support incremental sync
0.1.5	2020-11-30	1038	Change JDBC sources to discover more than standard schemas
0.1.4	2020-11-30	1046	Add connectors using an index YAML file

Provide feedback

Saved searches

Use saved searches to filter your results more quickly

postgres.md

postgres.md

Postgres

Features

Getting Started (Airbyte Cloud)

Getting Started (Airbyte Open-Source)

Requirements

1. Make sure your database is accessible from the machine running Airbyte

2. Create a dedicated read-only user with access to the relevant tables (Recommended but optional)

3. Optionally, set up CDC. Follow the guide below to do so.

4. That's it!

Change Data Capture (CDC) / Logical Replication / WAL Replication

Should I use CDC for Postgres?

CDC Limitations

Setting up CDC for Postgres

1. Enable logical replication

2. Add user-level permissions

3. Select replication plugin

4. Create replication slot

5. Create publications and replication identities for tables

6. Start syncing

CDC on Bare Metal, VMs (EC2/GCE/etc), Docker, etc.

CDC on AWS Postgres RDS or Aurora

CDC on Azure Database for Postgres

Connection via SSH Tunnel

Generating an RSA Private Key

Data type mapping

Changelog

Files

postgres.md

Latest commit

History

postgres.md

File metadata and controls

Postgres

Features

Getting Started (Airbyte Cloud)

Getting Started (Airbyte Open-Source)

Requirements

1. Make sure your database is accessible from the machine running Airbyte

2. Create a dedicated read-only user with access to the relevant tables (Recommended but optional)

3. Optionally, set up CDC. Follow the guide below to do so.

4. That's it!

Change Data Capture (CDC) / Logical Replication / WAL Replication

Should I use CDC for Postgres?

CDC Limitations

Setting up CDC for Postgres

1. Enable logical replication

2. Add user-level permissions

3. Select replication plugin

4. Create replication slot

5. Create publications and replication identities for tables

6. Start syncing

CDC on Bare Metal, VMs (EC2/GCE/etc), Docker, etc.

CDC on AWS Postgres RDS or Aurora

CDC on Azure Database for Postgres

Connection via SSH Tunnel

Generating an RSA Private Key

Data type mapping

Changelog