Connect to PostgreSQL

The database connection page contains the host, port, username, database name, and connection string for your PostgreSQL instance.

Connection string

A PostgreSQL connection string usually looks like this:

postgresql://<user>:<password>@<host>:5432/<database>?sslmode=require

Set it as an environment variable in your application:

export DATABASE_URL="postgresql://<user>:<password>@<host>:5432/<database>?sslmode=require"

psql "$DATABASE_URL"

Run a simple query:

select version();

Use TLS for application connections. If your framework supports sslmode=require, keep it enabled in production.

postgresql://<user>:<password>@<host>:5432/<database>?sslmode=require

import pg from "pg";

const pool = new pg.Pool({
  connectionString: process.env.DATABASE_URL,
  ssl: { rejectUnauthorized: false }
});

require "pg"

conn = PG.connect(ENV.fetch("DATABASE_URL"))
puts conn.exec("select now()").first

import os
import psycopg

with psycopg.connect(os.environ["DATABASE_URL"]) as conn:
    print(conn.execute("select now()").fetchone())

Treat database passwords like secrets. Do not commit connection strings to Git.