# Postgres 11 - A First Look

DevFeed: [Postgres 11 - A First Look](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/postgres-11-a-first-look-41208.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://www.craigkerstiens.com/2018/09/20/postgresql-11-a-first-look/>)

Author: Map

Published: 2018-09-20T20:55:56Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [Craig Kerstiens](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/craig-kerstiens.md>)

Topics: [PostgreSQL](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/postgresql.md>), [releases](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/releases.md>), [Usability](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/usability.md>), [parallel](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/parallel.md>)

Tags: [performance](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/performance.md>), [postgres](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/postgres.md>), [postgresql](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/postgresql.md>), [release-notes](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/release-notes.md>), [usability](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/usability.md>)

## AI overview

A first look at PostgreSQL 11 highlights usability improvements, safer addition of NOT NULL columns with default values without a full table rewrite, and maturing parallelism support.

## Source excerpt

Postgres 11 is almost here, in fact the latest beta shipped today, and it features a lot of exciting improvements. If you want to get the full list of features it is definitely worth checking out the release notes, but for those who don't read the release notes I put together a run down of some what I consider the highlight features. Quitting Postgres This is a small usability feature, but so long over due. Now you can quit Postgres by simply typing quit or exit. Previously you had to use Ctrl + D or \q. As a begginer it's one thing to jump into a psql terminal, but once in if you can't figure out how to quit it's a frustrating experience. Small usability features, such as this and watch in an earlier release, are often lost in the highlighted features which talk about performance or new data types. Improvements like this really go a long way for making Postgres a better database for everyone. Fear column addition no more Brandur had a great in depth write-up on this feature already, but it falls somewhere into the category of the above as well as a performance improvement. Previously when you added a new column that was NOT NULL with a default value Postgres would have to take a lock and re-write the entire table. In a production environment on any sizable table for all practical purposes the result was an outage. The work around was to break your migrations apart to be a several step process. With Postgres 11 you can add a new column to a table that is not null with a default value. The new row will get materialized on your database without requiring a full re-write. Here is to having to think less about your migrations. Of course performance is a highlight No Postgres release would be complete without some performance improvements. This release there are really two areas that feature key improvements around performance. Parallelism continuing to mature We first saw parallelism support back in PostgreSQL 9.6. At the time it was primarily for sequential scans, whic