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This guide provides a quick and manual way to backup and restore a PostgreSQL database running inside a Docker container using pg_dump and pg_restore.

Backup PostgreSQL (Dump)

To create a binary-format backup of your PostgreSQL database, run the following command from your host machine:

docker exec postgres_db pg_dump -Fc --user=odoo --dbname=my_db > my_db.dump

What this does:

• Executes pg_dump inside the Docker container named postgres_db
• Dumps the database my_db using the user odoo
• Uses the custom format (-Fc) which is suitable for use with pg_restore
• Saves the output to a file named my_db.dump in the current directory on the host machine

Restore PostgreSQL

To restore the database from a previously created dump file:

1. Copy the dump file into the container:

docker cp "my_db.dump" "postgres_db:/tmp/my_db.dump"

2. Run the restore command:

docker exec -i "postgres_db" pg_restore -U "odoo" -C -d postgres "/tmp/my_db.dump"

What this does:

• Restores the database using pg_restore inside the container
• The -C flag tells it to create the database
• The dump is restored into the default postgres database as a starting point

Version Compatibility Notice

Ensure that the PostgreSQL version used for dumping and restoring belongs to the same major version branch.

Compatible example:

• Dumped with PostgreSQL 16.3
• Restored with PostgreSQL 16.8

Incompatible example:

• Dumped with PostgreSQL 13.5
• Restored with PostgreSQL 16.3

Always verify your PostgreSQL version inside Docker using:

docker exec postgres_db psql -U odoo -c "SELECT version();"