Changelog

Neon Authorize

Announced at our Neon Deploy event earlier this week was Neon Authorize. This Neon feature integrates with third-party JWT-based authentication providers like Auth0 and Clerk, bringing authorization closer to your data by leveraging Row-Level Security (RLS) at the database level.

Build RAG pipelines with the pgrag extension

Also introduced at Neon Deploy, our new pgrag Postgres extension supports creating end-to-end Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) pipelines. No additional programming languages or libraries are required. With functions provided by pgrag, you can build a complete RAG pipeline from without leaving your SQL client.

pg_mooncake support

We added support for pg_mooncake, a new Postgres extension that adds native columnstore tables with DuckDB execution. Read the blog post for more.

And don't forget to check out this week's fixes and improvements:

Neon on Azure update

A few weeks ago we announced the Neon on Azure Beta and we invited everyone to try it out free of charge. The Beta period is coming to an end as of of Dec 1, 2024, and any Neon projects created on Azure by paid plan accounts will be come billable, meaning that storage and compute used by those projects will be counted toward your Neon plan allowances and any extra usage will incur charges. Projects created on the Free plan remain free. Thank you to all of our early Neon on Azure adopters. You've help us make Neon better. Stay tuned for news about Neon on Azure.

Read Replicas on the Free Plan

You may have seen the announcement earlier this week: Read replicas are now available in the Free Plan.

If you're not familiar Neon Read Replicas, you might be interested to know that we take a fundamentally different approach by leveraging our serverless architecture. In Neon, read replicas are independent compute instances designed to handle read operations on the same data as your primary read-write compute. There's no replication or copying of data involved, allowing you to create a read replica almost instantly with no additional storage cost.

Neon's Read Replicas support a variety of use cases, including:

• Horizontal scaling
• Analytics and ad-hoc queries
• Read-only data access

To learn more about Neon Read Replicas, check out these docs and articles:

• Neon Read Replica documentation
• Blog: The problem with Postgres replicas
• Case Study: Neon Read Replicas in The Wild: How BeatGig Uses Them

Postgres extension updates

We added support for several extensions to Postgres 17, including pgvector 7.4.

Now available on Postgres 17:

In addition, we updated the following extension versions on Postgres 14, 15, and 16:

For a complete list of Postgres extensions supported by Neon and upgrade instructions, see Postgres extensions.

Neon SQL Editor AI features are now open to everyone

The AI-driven features in the Neon SQL Editor we opened to Early Access users a few weeks ago are now available to everyone. In case you missed that announcement, here's what's new:

• SQL generation: Convert natural language requests to SQL with ease. Press the ✨ button or use Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+M, type your request, and the AI assistant will generate the corresponding SQL. It’s schema-aware, so you can reference table names, functions, and other objects in your schema.
• Fix with AI: When your query returns an error, click Fix with AI next to the error message. The AI assistant will analyze the issue, suggest a fix, and update the SQL Editor so you can run the query again.
• AI-generated query names: Queries in the Neon SQL Editor's History are automatically assigned descriptive names. This feature helps you quickly identify and reuse previous queries.

To learn more, see Neon SQL Editor AI features.

Easier User to Org account conversion

We've introduced a new way to convert personal Neon accounts to organization accounts. Previously, this process required setting up a new organization, transferring projects, and entering billing details again. You can now convert your user account to an organization with a single action. This will instantly transfer all of your projects and billing to the new organization, with no service disruption and no changes to your connections. Your personal account will automatically switch to the Free Plan after conversion.

For more details on how to convert your account, see Convert your personal account.

And don't forget to check out this week's fixes and improvements:

New monitoring graphs

We're continuing to improve visibility into your database performance with two new graphs on the Monitoring page: LFC hit rate and Working set size.

The Local file cache hit rate graph shows the percentage of read requests served from memory. A high hit rate indicates better performance, as more data is served from cache (faster) instead of being pulled from storage (slower). See What is the Local File Cache for more info.

The Working set size graph tracks the amount of data your database accesses over time. For best performance, your working set should fit within the LFC, minimizing slower queries that pull data from storage. See Working set size for details.

New banner for custom date range selection

Along with the new graphs on the Monitoring page, we also now added a banner to show your custom date range selection, making it a bit easier to keep track of your selected time frame when analyzing performance metrics.

Postgres extension updates

We added support for the following extensions to Postgres 17.

For a complete list of Postgres extensions supported by Neon, see Postgres extensions.

Support for removing backup branches created by restore operations

When working with branches, we recommend removing old and unused branches where possible. This helps free up disk space and keep your project organized. We’ve made that easier: you can now remove the backup branches created by restore operations on your project’s root branch (typically named main). Previously, the backup branches could not be removed.

For more details, and other recommendations, see Deleting backup branches.

10x-ing Projects on the Free Plan

You may have seen the announcement already — Neon Free Plan users can now create up to 10 projects. We hope this increase will make it easier for you to learn a new stack, build the AI-powered app you've been thinking about, ship an MVP, upgrade to the next version of Postgres, or anything else the previous limit kept you from doing. Why did we make this change? Read all about it here: 10x-ing our Free Plan: Everyone Gets Ten Projects.

To create a new project, navigate to the Projects page in the Neon Console and click New Project.

Please note that Free Plan account-level allowances for compute hours, storage, and bandwidth remain unchanged.

Drag-to-zoom monitoring graphs

We've enhanced the graphs on our Monitoring page to support drag-to-zoom. You can now click and drag to zoom in on a selected range.

Sign up for Neon Deploy

Join us online on October 30th at 10:00 AM PT to learn how Neon empowers developers to ship faster with Postgres. Tune in for Product updates and technical deep dives. Sign up today!

Neon on Azure is open for beta

Neon on Azure is now available for public beta! Create a new project now and try it out.

More projects

Customers with database-per-tenant, developer platforms, and AI Agents told us they needed more projects: we've expanded the project limits across all paid Neon plans.

New limits:

• Launch Plan: Up to 100 projects
• Scale Plan: Up to 1,000 projects
• Business Plan: Up to 5,000 projects

A reminder, last week we introduced the experimental @neondatabase/toolkit, which allows you to spin up a Postgres database in seconds and run SQL queries — ideal for quick setups and testing environments, and for taking advantage of your new, higher project limits.

ISO27110 & ISO27701 compliance

These new certifications add to our growing list of compliance achievements. For more about Neon's compliance milestones, see Compliance.

Database limits per branch

In case you missed last week's heads up — this week we've started enforcing a limit of 500 roles and 500 databases per branch. If you have any concerns about these new limits, please reach out to the Neon Support team. Previously, these limits were recommended but not enforced.

At a glance metrics for Free plan users

We're making it easier for Free Plan users to check how much room you've got left on your account-level metrics. Find it on your Projects page.

And we've also added a project-level usage widget on the Project Dashbaord as well, letting you know your current consumption levels for the month for each individual project.

Guests are now Collaborators

We've renamed Project sharing to Collaborators in both your Project and Organization settings pages in the Neon Console. This update streamlines collaboration with other users, whether from a personal account project or with external users for Organization-owned projects.

To manage collaboration from the project level, Project → Settings → Collaborators. And to manage collaboration for all projects in your Organization, Organization → People → Collaborators.

Support for Postgres 17

We're excited to announce that Neon now supports Postgres 17. To start using Postgres 17, create a new Neon project and select 17 as the Postgres version. For detailed instructions, refer to our Create a project guide.

If you need to migrate data from an existing Neon project to one running Postgres 17, check out our Upgrading your Postgres version guide for supported migration options.

As always, it's important to thoroughly test before migrating production data or applications. We recommend reviewing the key changes in Postgres 17, which you can find in the Postgres Release 17 documentation.

Early Access to AI Features in Neon SQL Editor

Join our Early Access Program to try out the AI features we're testing in the Neon SQL Editor.

Explore three AI-driven features:

• SQL generation: Convert natural language requests to SQL with ease. Press the ✨ button or use Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+M, type your request, and the AI assistant will generate the corresponding SQL. It’s schema-aware, so you can reference table names, functions, and other objects in your schema.
• Fix with AI: When your query returns an error, click Fix with AI next to the error message. The AI assistant will analyze the issue, suggest a fix, and update the SQL Editor so you can run the query again.
• AI-generated query names: Queries in the Neon SQL Editor's History are automatically assigned descriptive names. This feature helps you quickly identify and reuse previous queries.

A new Postgres toolkit for AI agents and test environments

We're excited to announce an experimental release of the @neondatabase/toolkit (@neon/toolkit on JSR). This toolkit lets you spin up a Postgres database in seconds and run SQL queries. It includes both the Neon API Client and the Neon Serverless Driver, making it an excellent choice for AI agents that need to quickly set up an SQL database, or for test environments where manually deploying a new database isn't practical.

With a few lines of code, you can create a Postgres database on Neon, run SQL queries, and tear down the database when you're done. Here's a quick look:

import { NeonToolkit } from "@neondatabase/toolkit";

const toolkit = new NeonToolkit(process.env.API_KEY!);
const project = await toolkit.createProject();

await toolkit.sql(
  project,
  `
    CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS
        users (
            id UUID PRIMARY KEY,
            name VARCHAR(255) NOT NULL
        );
`,
);

await toolkit.sql(
  project,
  `
    INSERT INTO users (id, name) VALUES (gen_random_uuid(), 'Sam Altman');
`,
);

console.log(
  await toolkit.sql(
    project,
    `
    SELECT name FROM users;
`,
  ),
);

await toolkit.deleteProject(project);

As with all of our experimental features, changes are ongoing. If you have any feedback, we'd love to hear it. Let us know via the Feedback form in the Neon Console or our feedback channel on Discord.

Neon Organizations now in Public Beta

We're happy to announce that the Neon Organizations feature is now available in Public Beta.

Create a new organization, transfer over your projects, invite your team members and get started collaborating. The Organizations feature lets you manage all of your team's projects under a single account — with billing, role management, and project transfer capabilities in one accessible location.

See Neon Organizations to get started. Organizations is a paid account feature.

This week’s changelog – Live from Lisbon!

Our team is in Lisbon this week, wrapping up Q3 and refining our roadmap. It's been a great opportunity to reconnect, welcome new colleagues, meet with customers, and ensure we're delivering on the features and improvements our users are asking for.

As we look ahead as a team, here's a quick look back at some key features we've released over the past few months:

• Inbound Logical Replication: Enables low-downtime migrations to Neon from other providers and between Neon projects. Check out our guides on Replicating Data to Neon and Project-to-Project Replication.
• Organizations: Now available for Early Access users. This long-requested feature allows you to create and manage your organization's projects and teams from a single account. Join our Early Access Program and refer to the Organizations docs for more information.
• Autoscaling GA: Neon's Autoscaling feature is now generally available, automatically adjusting resources as needed. Read the announcement here and explore the Autoscaling docs.
• Autoscaling on Free Plan: Free Plan users can now experience Neon's Autoscaling. Learn more in the Autoscaling Guide.
• A New Business Plan: Offers 500 GiB of storage and 1,000 compute hours, with potential cost savings for customers needing more storage than offered by our Scale plan. Learn more on our Pricing and Plans pages.

We do have a few small updates to share this week, which you can check out below.

A new Business plan with more compute and storage

We're pleased to announce that we've launched a new Business plan that provides higher storage and compute allowances (500 GiB of storage and 1,000 compute hours) in addition to all of Neon's advanced features. This plan offers potential cost savings for customers requiring more than our Scale plan provides.

To learn more about our new plan, please refer to our Pricing page and Plans documentation.

New monitoring graphs for Read Replicas

We added two new charts to the Monitoring page in the Neon Console for monitoring Read Replica replication lag. These charts are visible when selecting a Replica compute from the Compute drop-down menu.

• Replication delay bytes: Measures the total size, in bytes, of the data that has been sent from the primary compute but has not yet been applied on the replica.

  

• Replication delay seconds: Indicates the time delay, in seconds, between the last transaction committed on the primary compute and the application of that transaction on the replica.

  

For more information, see Monitoring dashboard.

A Protected Branches update

New passwords are automatically generated for Postgres roles on branches created from protected branches. You can learn more about this feature here.

Previously, resetting or restoring a child branch (where passwords were previously regenerated) reset the passwords back to those used on the parent branch. Now, when you perform a branch reset or restore operation from a protected branch, the role passwords on the child branch are preserved.

The protected branches feature is available with the Neon Scale or Business plan. To learn more, refer to our Protected Branches guide.

Autoscaling is now GA

In case you missed the announcement earlier this week, we're excited to share that Neon's Autoscaling feature is now generally available. Autoscaling has been a core objective for Neon from the very beginning. With Autoscaling, your database automatically adjusts its compute resources up or down based on demand, including scaling down to zero when not in use. This feature is now ready for production, making it easier than ever to manage workloads efficiently.

If you're not yet familiar with Neon's Autoscaling feature, you can learn more here:

• An introduction to Neon's Autoscaling
• Understanding Neon's Autoscaling algorithm
• Enabling Autoscaling

Autoscaling on the Free Plan

In addition to our Autoscaling GA announcement, we've made Autoscaling available on our Free Plan, where you can automatically scale computes from 0.25 vCPU with 1 GB of RAM up to 2 vCPU with 8 GB of RAM. To learn how, see Enabling Autoscaling.

When you try Autoscaling on the Free Plan, we recommend monitoring your monthly compute hour allowance. A compute that scales up regularly to meet demand will consume your compute hour allowance more quickly.

Postgres version updates

Supported Postgres versions were updated to 14.13, 15.8, and 16.4, respectively.

Upcoming change for branch reset and restore from a protected branch

A few weeks ago, we introduced a new protected branches feature: When you create a child branch from a protected branch, new passwords are automatically generated for the matching Postgres roles on the child branch. This helps prevent the exposure of passwords that could be used to access your protected branch. You can read more about this feature here.

Next week, we'll be making a related change, and we wanted to give you a heads-up in case any updates are needed for your CI scripts or workflows. Coming next week: When you perform a branch reset or restore operation on a child branch, the role passwords on the child branch will be preserved. Currently, resetting or restoring a child branch (where passwords were previously regenerated) resets the passwords back to those used on the parent branch.

The protected branches feature is available with the Neon Scale plan. To learn more, refer to our Protected Branches guide.