PostgreSQL compatibility

YugabyteDB is a PostgreSQL compatible distributed database that supports the majority of PostgreSQL syntax. This means that existing applications built on PostgreSQL can often be migrated to YugabyteDB without changing application code.

Since YugabyteDB is PostgreSQL compatible, it works with the majority of PostgreSQL database tools such as various language drivers, ORM tools, schema migration tools, and many more third-party database tools.

Since YugabyteDB is a distributed database, supporting all PostgreSQL features easily in a distributed system is not always feasible. This page documents the known list of differences between PostgreSQL and YugabyteDB. You need to consider these differences while porting an existing application to YugabyteDB.

Unsupported PostgreSQL features

The following PostgreSQL features are not supported in YugabyteDB:

Pessimistic locking
Table locks
Inheritance
Exclusion Constraints
GiST indexes
Kerberos/GSSAPI
Events (Listen/Notify)
Drop primary key
XML Functions
XA syntax