# Poisoned Postgres connection pools

DevFeed: [Poisoned Postgres connection pools](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/poisoned-postgres-connection-pools-2331.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://planetscale.com/blog/postgres-poisoned-connection-pools>)

Author: Josh Brown

Published: 2026-08-18T00:00:00Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [Blog -- PlanetScale](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/blog-planetscale.md>)

Topics: [Database](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/database.md>), [postgresql clusters](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/postgresql-clusters.md>), [client](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/client.md>), [API](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/api.md>)

Tags: [api](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/api.md>), [database](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/database.md>), [engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/engineering.md>), [postgres](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/postgres.md>)

## AI overview

The article explains how stale session state can poison Postgres connection pools, causing reused connections to remain read-only and trigger errors. It focuses on connection pooling, PgBouncer transaction mode, and the resulting effects on client queries and API routes.

## Source excerpt

An engineer's worst nightmare is waking up to a seemingly read-only database with no clear issue in sight. Let's dig into why this happens, and how AI can help solve it.