PostgreSQL Dialect Support

Spanner provides PostgreSQL dialect support by expressing Spanner database features through a subset of open source PostgreSQL dialect constructs.

Key Considerations

• Portability: Easier migration to other PostgreSQL databases if needed.
• Familiarity: Leverages existing knowledge of PostgreSQL syntax and tools.
• Ecosystem: Supports tools like psql and PostgreSQL drivers (via PGAdapter).

Features and Extensions

Spanner includes extensions to support Spanner-specific features within the PostgreSQL dialect:

• Interleaved tables
• Time to live (TTL)
• Query hints

Limitations

Spanner does not support some open source PostgreSQL features:

• Triggers
• SERIAL
• Transactional DDL
• User-defined data types and operators

For more information, see The PostgreSQL language in Spanner.