Setting Up PostgreSQL with Docker

Using Docker Compose to set up PostgreSQL in a development environment greatly simplifies version management and portability.

docker-compose.yml

version: '3.8'
services:
  postgres:
    image: postgres:16-alpine
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: postgres
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: postgres
      POSTGRES_DB: myapp
    ports:
      - '5432:5432'
    volumes:
      - postgres_data:/var/lib/postgresql/data
volumes:
  postgres_data:

Advantages

• Different PostgreSQL versions for different projects
• Start/stop with a single command
• Data persistence with volumes

Connection

While the container is running, you can connect via localhost:5432.