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How Rowsafe compares

Honest comparisons with the usual ways to back up PostgreSQL, including when something else is the better choice. Rowsafe is for PostgreSQL you run yourself: continuous backups to your own bucket, restore to any second, and a restore tested every week.

Checked on , with sources on every page.

Guide

The best way to back up PostgreSQL on a VPS

Use continuous WAL archiving so you can restore to any moment, keep encrypted copies off the server, and test a restore on a schedule. You can build that yourself with pgBackRest, WAL-G or Barman, or use a service such as Rowsafe that sets it up and tests it for you. A nightly pg_dump is a useful extra, but on its own it can lose a day of writes.

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Comparisons

What Rowsafe doesn't do (yet)

So you can rule it out quickly if it isn't the right fit.

PostgreSQL first
PostgreSQL 13 to 18 is fully supported. MySQL, MariaDB and MongoDB are in beta. Redis and Valkey are planned, not available.
Not for managed databases
Rowsafe runs an agent on the database server and configures WAL archiving, so it can't protect Amazon RDS, Supabase, Neon, DigitalOcean Managed Databases or similar. Those have their own point-in-time recovery.
Linux servers only
Debian 12/13 or Ubuntu 22.04/24.04 (amd64 or arm64) on the host, or Docker next to the official postgres image on a Linux host.
One restart to turn it on
WAL archiving needs archive_mode=on, which takes effect after a PostgreSQL restart. Rowsafe never restarts PostgreSQL on its own; you pick the moment.
One-click restores stay on the same server
Restoring a copy, bringing back rows and rewinding happen on the database's own server. Rewinding the whole database in place isn't available with tablespaces yet, and in Docker it needs the optional container control service; bringing back rows needs a primary key. Restoring onto a new server, after the old one is lost, is a documented pgBackRest procedure in the restore guide.
Up to about a minute behind
On a quiet database, up to about a minute of the newest writes may not be in your bucket yet. Busy databases ship each 16 MB WAL segment as soon as it fills.
Restore tests need disk space
Proof restores a full copy on the same server, so it needs free disk of about 1.3 × the database size plus 1 GiB. With less, the test doesn't start and you get an alert.
One standby, no hosting
One standby server per database, on Linux servers (not Docker). Rowsafe doesn't host databases for you, resize servers or encrypt disks: that stays with your hosting provider.
Databases and their upload folders
Rowsafe backs up databases and the folders that go with them, such as uploads. No whole-server or volume snapshots: keep a separate tool for those.
Upgrades need Debian or Ubuntu packages
One-click updates and major upgrades use apt and Debian's cluster tools. In Docker, Rowsafe checks and rehearses an upgrade, and you change the image tag.
One WAL archiver per database
If pgBackRest, WAL-G or Barman already archives WAL for a database, Rowsafe won't replace its archive_command unless you pass --force.
A hosted control plane
Scheduling, the dashboard and alerts run as a service operated by Rowsafe, which stores metadata only (never backup contents or keys). There is no self-hosted edition.

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