Setting Up Postgres via Homebrew

The Basics

Getting started is fairly straightforward as with any homebrew install, but i’ve managed to run into a couple of gotchas or unexpected settings that need to be sorted out which ill get to in the next section. For now installation is as easy as

$ brew install postgres@{version}

this will get you set up with a fresh install of the specified version. In order to run this instance of postgres there are a few options.

1. Run it as a homebrew service via the brew services start postgres@{version} this will run it in the background and can be restarted with the similar command brew services restart postgres@{version}
2. if you dont need it ran in the background LC_ALL="C" /opt/homebrew/opt/postgresql@17/bin/postgres -D /opt/homebrew/var/postgresql@17 will run a foreground task.
3. my preferred method however is to use dbngin a gui for starting and stopping background tasks specifically databases installed on your system. brew install dbngin will get you going there.

Users

By default homebrews postgres install doesnt come with the standard postgres:postgres user password. Its setup around your system username and w/o a password.

# to open the postgres repl
$ psql postgres

# find the username created with homebrew
postgres=# \du

# leave repl
postgres=# \q

# set a password for user
$ psql -U userFromAbove pickAPassword

Something to keep in mind is homebrew adds a version suffix to some postgres installs. For example at the time of writing if you have postgres17 installed youll need to execute psql as psql-17