How To Install PostgreSQL on CentOS 8

In this tutorial, we will show you how to install PostgreSQL on CentOS 8. For those of you who didn’t know, PostgreSQL is a powerful, open-source object-relational database management system renowned for its reliability, data integrity, and robust feature set. In the realm of enterprise-level applications and web development, PostgreSQL has emerged as a popular choice due to its SQL compliance, support for advanced data types, and extensive community backing.

This article assumes you have at least basic knowledge of Linux, know how to use the shell, and most importantly, you host your site on your own VPS. The installation is quite simple and assumes you are running in the root account, if not you may need to add ‘sudo‘ to the commands to get root privileges. I will show you the step-by-step install PostgreSQL on the CentOS 8 server.

Prerequisites

• A server running one of the following operating systems: CentOS 8.
• It’s recommended that you use a fresh OS install to prevent any potential issues.
• SSH access to the server (or just open Terminal if you’re on a desktop).
• A non-root sudo user or access to the root user. We recommend acting as a non-root sudo user, however, as you can harm your system if you’re not careful when acting as the root.

Install PostgreSQL on CentOS 8

Step 1. Before installing any new software, it’s crucial to ensure your system is up-to-date with the latest package versions. Open a terminal and run the following commands to update the package lists and upgrade installed packages:

sudo dnf clean all
sudo dnf update

Step 2. Install PostgreSQL on CentOS 8.

Next, add the PostgreSQL repository to your CentOS 8 system and install the PostgreSQL server package:

sudo dnf install https://download.postgresql.org/pub/repos/yum/reporpms/EL-8-x86_64/pgdg-redhat-repo-latest.noarch.rpm
sudo dnf install postgresql14-server

This command installs the latest stable version of PostgreSQL (14 at the time of writing). If you prefer a different version, replace 14 with the desired version number.

Verify the installation by checking the PostgreSQL version:

postgres --version

Once the installation is complete, the PostgreSQL installation will not be enabled for automatic start or have the database initialized automatically. To make your database installation complete, you need to perform the following steps:

sudo /usr/pgsql-14/bin/postgresql-14-setup initdb

Start the PostgreSQL service and enable it to start on boot:

sudo systemctl enable --now postgresql-14

Verify the service status with:

sudo systemctl status postgresql-14

Step 3. Accessing PostgreSQL command prompt.

After installing the PostgreSQL database server, by default, it creates a user ‘postgres’ with role ‘postgres’. It also creates a system account with the same name ‘postgres’. So to connect to the Postgres server, log in to your system as a user of Postgres and connect database:

su - postgres
psql

Now you are logged in to the PostgreSQL database server. To check login info use the following command from a database command prompt:

postgres-# \conninfo

To disconnect from the PostgreSQL database command prompt just type the below command and press enter. It will return you back to the Ubuntu command prompt:

postgres-# \q

Create new user and database:

### For example, let us create a new user called “mailana” with password “meilanamaria”, and database called “meilanadb”. ###
sudo -u postgres createuser -D -A -P meilana
sudo -u postgres createdb -O mailana meilanadb

Congratulations! You have successfully installed PostgreSQL. Thanks for using this tutorial for installing PostgreSQL on CentOS 8 systems. For additional help or useful information, we recommend you check the official PostgreSQL website.