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Activity Events Postgresql store

Using Postgres for fresh installations

The default configuration for fresh installations is SQLite storage. However users have the option to leverage the benefits of Postgres for new instances beginning from version 0.46.0.

To enable Postgres add to your management service the following environmental variable:

NB_ACTIVITY_EVENT_STORE_ENGINE=postgres
NB_ACTIVITY_EVENT_POSTGRES_DSN=host=localhost port=5432 user=<user> password=<password> dbname=<db_name>

You can switch back to sqlite storage by setting the NB_ACTIVITY_EVENT_STORE_ENGINE variable to sqlite.

Switching between storage options requires migration steps to prevent data loss.

Migrating from SQLite store to Postgres store

This migration process allows users to seamlessly transition between storage options while maintaining data integrity.

The following commands assume you use the latest docker version with the compose plugin. If you have docker-compose installed as a standalone, please use docker-compose as a command.

  1. Backup your data store (events.db in datadir - default /var/lib/netbird/)
mkdir backup
docker compose cp -a management:/var/lib/netbird/. backup/
  1. Import Sqlite data to Postgres

For migrating the Sqlite data we rely on the pgloader tool. You can install it by running sudo apt-get install pgloader on debian or brew install pgloader on MacOS.

pgloader --type sqlite backup/events.db "postgresql://<PG_USER>:<PG_PASSWORD>@<PG_HOST>:<PG_PORT>/<PG_DB_NAME>"
  1. Create .env file with the following content:
NB_ACTIVITY_EVENT_STORE_ENGINE=postgres
NB_ACTIVITY_EVENT_POSTGRES_DSN="host=<PG_HOST> user=<PG_USER> password=<PG_PASSWORD> dbname=<PG_DB_NAME> port=<PG_PORT>"
  1. Update docker-compose.yml file to pass the postgres configuration to the management container
environment:
  - NB_ACTIVITY_EVENT_STORE_ENGINE=${NB_ACTIVITY_EVENT_STORE_ENGINE}
  - NB_ACTIVITY_EVENT_POSTGRES_DSN=${NB_ACTIVITY_EVENT_POSTGRES_DSN}
env_file:
  - .env
  1. Restart the management service
docker compose restart management
  1. Check logs to confirm the store switch:
docker compose logs management

You should see an entry similar to:

2025-06-06T18:23:17+03:00 INFO [context: SYSTEM] management/server/activity/store/sql_store.go:260: using postgres as activity event store engine

Rollback to Sqlite store

To rollback to the Sqlite store, follow these steps:

The following commands assume you use the latest docker version with the compose plugin. If you have docker-compose installed as a standalone, please use docker-compose as a command.

  1. Restore events.db backup
docker compose cp backup/events.db management:/var/lib/netbird/events.db
  1. Enable SQLite by setting the NB_ACTIVITY_EVENT_STORE_ENGINE environment variable to sqlite:
NB_ACTIVITY_EVENT_STORE_ENGINE=sqlite
  1. Restart the Management service.
docker compose restart management
  1. Check logs to confirm the store switch:
docker compose logs management

You should see an entry similar to:

2025-06-06T18:24:19+03:00 INFO [context: SYSTEM] management/server/activity/store/sql_store.go:260: using sqlite as activity event store engine