25 PostgreSQL Tricks Every Backend Engineer Should Know

Anurag Goel

7 min read

·

Jul 14, 2026

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Most backend engineers never actually outgrow PostgreSQL. What they outgrow is the way they’re using it.

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After years of running production systems with hundreds of millions of rows, I’ve learned that most PostgreSQL performance problems aren’t fixed by throwing more CPU or RAM at the database. They’re fixed by understanding how PostgreSQL thinks.

These are the techniques that have consistently paid off for me — the ones I wish someone had handed me on day one.

1. Kill SELECT *

The cheapest performance win in this entire list.

Bad:

SELECT *
FROM users
WHERE id = 123;

Better:

SELECT name, email
FROM users
WHERE id = 123;

Every extra column forces PostgreSQL to read more pages, shuffle more data, and push more bytes across the wire. Worse, SELECT * frequently rules out Index Only Scans — one of the fastest access paths the planner has.

2. Make EXPLAIN Your Default Reflex

Never tune a query on gut feeling. Run:

EXPLAIN ANALYZE

and actually read the output. Watch for Sequential Scans, Nested Loops, Hash Joins, Bitmap…