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Postgres as a Real-time Messaging Backend

1 post · Feb 2026

What this trail covers

PlanetScale offers a managed Postgres service that can be used as a real-time message broker. This post explores using logical replication to stream data, such as video frames and audio, from database tables to connected clients. The implementation involves a SvelteKit frontend, a Node.js WebSocket server for relaying messages, and PostgreSQL for durable storage and real-time distribution. The post also discusses alternative approaches like LISTEN/NOTIFY and unlogged tables, and demonstrates how to manage accumulating rows with cleanup jobs and how to keep audio in sync with clamping.

All PlanetScale trails
  1. Video Conferencing with PostgresThis post demonstrates using PostgreSQL's logical replication to stream real-time data (video frames and audio) for a video conferencing application. It details the implementation using a SvelteKit frontend, a Node.js WebSocket relay, and PlanetScale PostgreSQL. Key technical contributions include: using `INSERT` statements to store media frames in `video_frames` and `audio_frames` tables, leveraging logical replication to stream these frames to recipients, implementing a cleanup job to prune old frames, and addressing audio synchronization issues with clamping. It also contrasts this approach with `LISTEN/NOTIFY` and unlogged tables, highlighting the trade-offs.