Neki – Sharded Postgres
Points and comments are a snapshot, not live.
PlanetScale launches Neki, a sharded Postgres offering with real Postgres on each shard.
Neki is PlanetScale's sharded Postgres, now in platform preview. It uses a router speaking the Postgres wire protocol to distribute queries across shards, each a full Postgres cluster with one primary and at least two replicas across three availability zones. Users define a JSON data topology mapping tables to shard groups. Features include connection pooling via sidecars, online schema changes, version upgrades, failovers, imports, and resharding. Neki can run unsharded initially and reshard later. PlanetScale advises against production use during the preview.
What commenters are saying
Commenters were excited about a sharded Postgres product but criticized the blog post for failing to define Neki early, noting the marketing site at neki.dev was clearer. Questions about consistency guarantees, cross-shard foreign keys, and two-phase commit support arose; a developer confirmed atomic cross-shard transactions are a work in progress. Comparisons were made to Citus and Vitess. Some worried about PlanetScale splitting focus, while others appreciated the design. A few comments criticized the CEO's public statements as divisive.
A developer clarified that cross-shard transactions are supported but not atomic 2PC, which is under development. The thread split between those impressed by the product and those demanding clearer documentation on consistency trade-offs.