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, namely database roles, tablespaces, and privilege grants
       for configuration parameters. (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 34.16 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. Repeating the option causes additional debug-level messages to
           appear on standard error. The option is also passed down to 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.

       --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.

       --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.

       --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.

       --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-table-access-method
           Do not output commands to select table access methods. With this option, all objects will be created
           with whichever table access method is the default during restore.

       --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-toast-compression
           Do not output commands to set TOAST compression methods. With this option, all columns will be
           restored with the default compression setting.

       --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 34.15).

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.