NAME

       pg_dumpall - extract a PostgreSQL database cluster into a script file

SYNOPSIS

       pg_dumpall [connection-option...] [option...]

DESCRIPTION

       pg_dumpall is a utility for writing out (“dumping”) all PostgreSQL databases of a cluster
       into one script file. The script file contains SQL commands that can be used as input to
       psql(1) to restore the databases. It does this by calling pg_dump(1) for each database in
       the cluster.  pg_dumpall also dumps global objects that are common to all databases, that
       is, database roles and tablespaces. (pg_dump does not save these objects.)

       Since pg_dumpall reads tables from all databases you will most likely have to connect as a
       database superuser in order to produce a complete dump. Also you will need superuser
       privileges to execute the saved script in order to be allowed to add roles and create
       databases.

       The SQL script will be written to the standard output. Use the -f/--file option or shell
       operators to redirect it into a file.

       pg_dumpall needs to connect several times to the PostgreSQL server (once per database). If
       you use password authentication it will ask for a password each time. It is convenient to
       have a ~/.pgpass file in such cases. See Section 33.15 for more information.

OPTIONS

       The following command-line options control the content and format of the output.

       -a
       --data-only
           Dump only the data, not the schema (data definitions).

       -c
       --clean
           Emit SQL commands to DROP all the dumped databases, roles, and tablespaces before
           recreating them. This option is useful when the restore is to overwrite an existing
           cluster. If any of the objects do not exist in the destination cluster, ignorable
           error messages will be reported during restore, unless --if-exists is also specified.

       -E encoding
       --encoding=encoding
           Create the dump in the specified character set encoding. By default, the dump is
           created in the database encoding. (Another way to get the same result is to set the
           PGCLIENTENCODING environment variable to the desired dump encoding.)

       -f filename
       --file=filename
           Send output to the specified file. If this is omitted, the standard output is used.

       -g
       --globals-only
           Dump only global objects (roles and tablespaces), no databases.

       -O
       --no-owner
           Do not output commands to set ownership of objects to match the original database. By
           default, pg_dumpall issues ALTER OWNER or SET SESSION AUTHORIZATION statements to set
           ownership of created schema elements. These statements will fail when the script is
           run unless it is started by a superuser (or the same user that owns all of the objects
           in the script). To make a script that can be restored by any user, but will give that
           user ownership of all the objects, specify -O.

       -r
       --roles-only
           Dump only roles, no databases or tablespaces.

       -s
       --schema-only
           Dump only the object definitions (schema), not data.

       -S username
       --superuser=username
           Specify the superuser user name to use when disabling triggers. This is relevant only
           if --disable-triggers is used. (Usually, it's better to leave this out, and instead
           start the resulting script as superuser.)

       -t
       --tablespaces-only
           Dump only tablespaces, no databases or roles.

       -v
       --verbose
           Specifies verbose mode. This will cause pg_dumpall to output start/stop times to the
           dump file, and progress messages to standard error. It will also enable verbose output
           in pg_dump.

       -V
       --version
           Print the pg_dumpall version and exit.

       -x
       --no-privileges
       --no-acl
           Prevent dumping of access privileges (grant/revoke commands).

       --binary-upgrade
           This option is for use by in-place upgrade utilities. Its use for other purposes is
           not recommended or supported. The behavior of the option may change in future releases
           without notice.

       --column-inserts
       --attribute-inserts
           Dump data as INSERT commands with explicit column names (INSERT INTO table (column,
           ...) VALUES ...). This will make restoration very slow; it is mainly useful for making
           dumps that can be loaded into non-PostgreSQL databases.

       --disable-dollar-quoting
           This option disables the use of dollar quoting for function bodies, and forces them to
           be quoted using SQL standard string syntax.

       --disable-triggers
           This option is relevant only when creating a data-only dump. It instructs pg_dumpall
           to include commands to temporarily disable triggers on the target tables while the
           data is restored. Use this if you have referential integrity checks or other triggers
           on the tables that you do not want to invoke during data restore.

           Presently, the commands emitted for --disable-triggers must be done as superuser. So,
           you should also specify a superuser name with -S, or preferably be careful to start
           the resulting script as a superuser.

       --extra-float-digits=ndigits
           Use the specified value of extra_float_digits when dumping floating-point data,
           instead of the maximum available precision. Routine dumps made for backup purposes
           should not use this option.

       --exclude-database=pattern
           Do not dump databases whose name matches pattern. Multiple patterns can be excluded by
           writing multiple --exclude-database switches. The pattern parameter is interpreted as
           a pattern according to the same rules used by psql's \d commands (see Patterns), so
           multiple databases can also be excluded by writing wildcard characters in the pattern.
           When using wildcards, be careful to quote the pattern if needed to prevent shell
           wildcard expansion.

       --if-exists
           Use DROP ... IF EXISTS commands to drop objects in --clean mode. This suppresses “does
           not exist” errors that might otherwise be reported. This option is not valid unless
           --clean is also specified.

       --inserts
           Dump data as INSERT commands (rather than COPY). This will make restoration very slow;
           it is mainly useful for making dumps that can be loaded into non-PostgreSQL databases.
           Note that the restore might fail altogether if you have rearranged column order. The
           --column-inserts option is safer, though even slower.

       --load-via-partition-root
           When dumping data for a table partition, make the COPY or INSERT statements target the
           root of the partitioning hierarchy that contains it, rather than the partition itself.
           This causes the appropriate partition to be re-determined for each row when the data
           is loaded. This may be useful when restoring data on a server where rows do not always
           fall into the same partitions as they did on the original server. That could happen,
           for example, if the partitioning column is of type text and the two systems have
           different definitions of the collation used to sort the partitioning column.

       --lock-wait-timeout=timeout
           Do not wait forever to acquire shared table locks at the beginning of the dump.
           Instead, fail if unable to lock a table within the specified timeout. The timeout may
           be specified in any of the formats accepted by SET statement_timeout. Allowed values
           vary depending on the server version you are dumping from, but an integer number of
           milliseconds is accepted by all versions since 7.3. This option is ignored when
           dumping from a pre-7.3 server.

       --no-comments
           Do not dump comments.

       --no-publications
           Do not dump publications.

       --no-role-passwords
           Do not dump passwords for roles. When restored, roles will have a null password, and
           password authentication will always fail until the password is set. Since password
           values aren't needed when this option is specified, the role information is read from
           the catalog view pg_roles instead of pg_authid. Therefore, this option also helps if
           access to pg_authid is restricted by some security policy.

       --no-security-labels
           Do not dump security labels.

       --no-subscriptions
           Do not dump subscriptions.

       --no-sync
           By default, pg_dumpall will wait for all files to be written safely to disk. This
           option causes pg_dumpall to return without waiting, which is faster, but means that a
           subsequent operating system crash can leave the dump corrupt. Generally, this option
           is useful for testing but should not be used when dumping data from production
           installation.

       --no-tablespaces
           Do not output commands to create tablespaces nor select tablespaces for objects. With
           this option, all objects will be created in whichever tablespace is the default during
           restore.

       --no-unlogged-table-data
           Do not dump the contents of unlogged tables. This option has no effect on whether or
           not the table definitions (schema) are dumped; it only suppresses dumping the table
           data.

       --on-conflict-do-nothing
           Add ON CONFLICT DO NOTHING to INSERT commands. This option is not valid unless
           --inserts or --column-inserts is also specified.

       --quote-all-identifiers
           Force quoting of all identifiers. This option is recommended when dumping a database
           from a server whose PostgreSQL major version is different from pg_dumpall's, or when
           the output is intended to be loaded into a server of a different major version. By
           default, pg_dumpall quotes only identifiers that are reserved words in its own major
           version. This sometimes results in compatibility issues when dealing with servers of
           other versions that may have slightly different sets of reserved words. Using
           --quote-all-identifiers prevents such issues, at the price of a harder-to-read dump
           script.

       --rows-per-insert=nrows
           Dump data as INSERT commands (rather than COPY). Controls the maximum number of rows
           per INSERT command. The value specified must be a number greater than zero. Any error
           during restoring will cause only rows that are part of the problematic INSERT to be
           lost, rather than the entire table contents.

       --use-set-session-authorization
           Output SQL-standard SET SESSION AUTHORIZATION commands instead of ALTER OWNER commands
           to determine object ownership. This makes the dump more standards compatible, but
           depending on the history of the objects in the dump, might not restore properly.

       -?
       --help
           Show help about pg_dumpall command line arguments, and exit.

       The following command-line options control the database connection parameters.

       -d connstr
       --dbname=connstr
           Specifies parameters used to connect to the server, as a connection string; these will
           override any conflicting command line options.

           The option is called --dbname for consistency with other client applications, but
           because pg_dumpall needs to connect to many databases, the database name in the
           connection string will be ignored. Use the -l option to specify the name of the
           database used for the initial connection, which will dump global objects and discover
           what other databases should be dumped.

       -h host
       --host=host
           Specifies the host name of the machine on which the database server is running. If the
           value begins with a slash, it is used as the directory for the Unix domain socket. The
           default is taken from the PGHOST environment variable, if set, else a Unix domain
           socket connection is attempted.

       -l dbname
       --database=dbname
           Specifies the name of the database to connect to for dumping global objects and
           discovering what other databases should be dumped. If not specified, the postgres
           database will be used, and if that does not exist, template1 will be used.

       -p port
       --port=port
           Specifies the TCP port or local Unix domain socket file extension on which the server
           is listening for connections. Defaults to the PGPORT environment variable, if set, or
           a compiled-in default.

       -U username
       --username=username
           User name to connect as.

       -w
       --no-password
           Never issue a password prompt. If the server requires password authentication and a
           password is not available by other means such as a .pgpass file, the connection
           attempt will fail. This option can be useful in batch jobs and scripts where no user
           is present to enter a password.

       -W
       --password
           Force pg_dumpall to prompt for a password before connecting to a database.

           This option is never essential, since pg_dumpall will automatically prompt for a
           password if the server demands password authentication. However, pg_dumpall will waste
           a connection attempt finding out that the server wants a password. In some cases it is
           worth typing -W to avoid the extra connection attempt.

           Note that the password prompt will occur again for each database to be dumped.
           Usually, it's better to set up a ~/.pgpass file than to rely on manual password entry.

       --role=rolename
           Specifies a role name to be used to create the dump. This option causes pg_dumpall to
           issue a SET ROLE rolename command after connecting to the database. It is useful when
           the authenticated user (specified by -U) lacks privileges needed by pg_dumpall, but
           can switch to a role with the required rights. Some installations have a policy
           against logging in directly as a superuser, and use of this option allows dumps to be
           made without violating the policy.

ENVIRONMENT

       PGHOST
       PGOPTIONS
       PGPORT
       PGUSER
           Default connection parameters

       PG_COLOR
           Specifies whether to use color in diagnostic messages. Possible values are always,
           auto and never.

       This utility, like most other PostgreSQL utilities, also uses the environment variables
       supported by libpq (see Section 33.14).

NOTES

       Since pg_dumpall calls pg_dump internally, some diagnostic messages will refer to pg_dump.

       The --clean option can be useful even when your intention is to restore the dump script
       into a fresh cluster. Use of --clean authorizes the script to drop and re-create the
       built-in postgres and template1 databases, ensuring that those databases will retain the
       same properties (for instance, locale and encoding) that they had in the source cluster.
       Without the option, those databases will retain their existing database-level properties,
       as well as any pre-existing contents.

       Once restored, it is wise to run ANALYZE on each database so the optimizer has useful
       statistics. You can also run vacuumdb -a -z to analyze all databases.

       The dump script should not be expected to run completely without errors. In particular,
       because the script will issue CREATE ROLE for every role existing in the source cluster,
       it is certain to get a “role already exists” error for the bootstrap superuser, unless the
       destination cluster was initialized with a different bootstrap superuser name. This error
       is harmless and should be ignored. Use of the --clean option is likely to produce
       additional harmless error messages about non-existent objects, although you can minimize
       those by adding --if-exists.

       pg_dumpall requires all needed tablespace directories to exist before the restore;
       otherwise, database creation will fail for databases in non-default locations.

EXAMPLES

       To dump all databases:

           $ pg_dumpall > db.out

       To restore database(s) from this file, you can use:

           $ psql -f db.out postgres

       It is not important to which database you connect here since the script file created by
       pg_dumpall will contain the appropriate commands to create and connect to the saved
       databases. An exception is that if you specified --clean, you must connect to the postgres
       database initially; the script will attempt to drop other databases immediately, and that
       will fail for the database you are connected to.

SEE ALSO

       Check pg_dump(1) for details on possible error conditions.