How to Redshift Cloud Native in PostgreSQL

How do I set up and optimize Redshift Cloud Native for PostgreSQL-style analytics?

Redshift Cloud Native lets you spin up fully-managed, auto-scaling Amazon Redshift clusters and run PostgreSQL-compatible SQL without capacity planning.

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Description

Example H2

Example H3

What makes Redshift Cloud Native different?

Cloud-native Redshift is serverless. It auto-scales compute and storage, charges per second, and keeps PostgreSQL syntax, so you write the same SQL but forget about nodes and vacuum jobs.

How do I create a cloud-native Redshift database?

In the AWS console pick “Redshift Serverless,” name a workgroup, pick an IAM role, then connect with any PostgreSQL client using the generated host, port 5439, and database name.

What is the basic table-creation syntax?

Use CREATE TABLE with DISTKEY and SORTKEY to tell Redshift how to distribute and order data for fast scans.

How do I load S3 data quickly?

Run COPY from an S3 URI. Redshift pulls files in parallel, so load terabytes in minutes. Make sure the IAM role has s3:GetObject permission.

Which keys speed up ecommerce analytics?

Choose a frequently filtered column (e.g., customer_id on Orders) as DISTKEY; pick a time column (e.g., order_date) as SORTKEY. Queries on recent orders then touch a single slice and scan only fresh blocks.

How can I query across schemas?

Create separate schemas for raw, staged, and analytics data to keep pipelines tidy. Use fully-qualified names (analytics.orders) to avoid naming collisions.

How do I monitor cost and performance?

Use the Redshift console “Monitoring” tab to watch concurrency, query duration, and slot usage. Pause your serverless workgroup when idle to stop the meter.

Best practice: keep files small

Split source data into 100–250 MB gzip files so each slice reads a file in parallel. Avoid a single multi-gigabyte object; it becomes a bottleneck.

Best practice: use automatic sort key updates

Enable AUTOMATIC TABLE OPTIMIZATION. Redshift analyzes workload patterns and rewrites DIST/SORT keys for you.

Why How to Redshift Cloud Native in PostgreSQL is important

How to Redshift Cloud Native in PostgreSQL Example Usage


-- Find last month’s top-spending customers
SELECT c.id, c.name, SUM(o.total_amount) AS lifetime_value
FROM   Customers c
JOIN   Orders    o ON o.customer_id = c.id
WHERE  o.order_date >= date_trunc('month', current_date) - INTERVAL '1 month'
GROUP  BY c.id, c.name
ORDER  BY lifetime_value DESC
LIMIT  10;

How to Redshift Cloud Native in PostgreSQL Syntax


-- Create ecommerce tables in Redshift Cloud Native
CREATE TABLE Customers (
    id          INT        IDENTITY(1,1),
    name        VARCHAR(255),
    email       VARCHAR(255),
    created_at  TIMESTAMPTZ
) DISTSTYLE KEY DISTKEY(id) SORTKEY(created_at);

CREATE TABLE Orders (
    id            INT        IDENTITY(1,1),
    customer_id   INT        NOT NULL,
    order_date    DATE,
    total_amount  NUMERIC(10,2)
) DISTSTYLE KEY DISTKEY(customer_id) SORTKEY(order_date);

CREATE TABLE Products (
    id     INT IDENTITY(1,1),
    name   VARCHAR(255),
    price  NUMERIC(10,2),
    stock  INT
) DISTSTYLE ALL;

CREATE TABLE OrderItems (
    id         INT IDENTITY(1,1),
    order_id   INT,
    product_id INT,
    quantity   INT
) DISTSTYLE EVEN SORTKEY(order_id);

-- Bulk load from S3
COPY Orders
FROM 's3://ecommerce-data/orders/'
IAM_ROLE 'arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/RedshiftCopyRole'
FORMAT AS PARQUET;

-- Pause serverless workgroup when idle (CLI)
aws redshift-serverless update-workgroup --workgroup-name dev --capacity-reservation false

Common Mistakes

Ignoring DISTKEY/SORTKEY leads to full-table scans. Fix by choosing distribution on frequently filtered columns and sort on time or range columns that appear in predicates.
Loading a single huge file with COPY throttles parallelism. Split data into many 100–250 MB files so each compute slice works concurrently.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Can I use psql with Redshift Serverless?

Yes. Supply the JDBC/ODBC endpoint or host, port 5439, database name, user, and password exactly as you would with PostgreSQL.

Does Redshift Cloud Native support PostgreSQL extensions?

Only a subset. Functions like json_extract_path_text work, but C-based extensions such as PostGIS are not supported.

How do I pause billing when idle?

Serverless workgroups auto-pause after a configurable idle period (default 30 minutes). You can also call update-workgroup to disable capacity reservation immediately.