36 postgres supabase review

Postgres & Supabase Review

Purpose

Conduct a structured review of a Supabase/Postgres project: schema design, Row-Level Security policies, indexes, foreign keys, migrations directory hygiene, connection pooling configuration, and auth.users coupling. Surface concrete risks with evidence from actual files, never from assumptions.

When to use

• A PR adds or modifies migrations, RLS policies, or schema changes in a Supabase project.
• A bug report hints at data leakage, missing RLS, or slow queries on Supabase tables.
• Onboarding a new project and auditing its database layer for security and performance correctness.
• The supabase/migrations/ directory has grown and no one has reviewed policy coverage recently.

When not to use

• The project uses a non-Postgres database (MySQL, SQLite, Mongo) — use a generic DB review instead.
• The task is a pure ORM-level TypeScript fix with no schema changes.
• You are already mid-migration with a running transaction; complete it first, review after.

Procedure

1. Orient to the project layout

ls supabase/migrations/ # migration files in chronological order
ls supabase/functions/ # edge functions that may use service_role
grep -r "service_role" . --include="*.ts" --include="*.env*" -l
grep -r "supabaseAdmin\|createClient.*service_role" . --include="*.ts" -n

Confirm which client (anon vs service_role) each backend surface uses. service_role bypasses RLS entirely — every usage must be intentional and server-side only.

2. Audit RLS coverage

-- Run in Supabase SQL editor or psql
SELECT
 schemaname,
 tablename,
 rowsecurity
FROM pg_tables
WHERE schemaname = 'public'
ORDER BY tablename;

Any table with rowsecurity = false that holds user data is a critical finding. Then check existing policies:

SELECT
 schemaname,
 tablename,
 policyname,
 permissive,
 roles,
 cmd,
 qual,
 with_check
FROM pg_policies
WHERE schemaname = 'public'
ORDER BY tablename, cmd;

Look for:

• Tables with INSERT/UPDATE policy but no SELECT policy (read leak).
• Policies using auth.uid() correctly vs. hardcoded UUIDs or true (open access).
• Policies that reference auth.users directly instead of auth.uid() — can cause plan regressions.

3. Check foreign key and index alignment

-- Missing indexes on FK columns (common performance trap)
SELECT
 tc.table_name,
 kcu.column_name,
 ccu.table_name AS foreign_table,
 ccu.column_name AS foreign_column
FROM information_schema.table_constraints AS tc
JOIN information_schema.key_column_usage AS kcu
 ON tc.constraint_name = kcu.constraint_name
JOIN information_schema.constraint_column_usage AS ccu
 ON ccu.constraint_name = tc.constraint_name
WHERE tc.constraint_type = 'FOREIGN KEY'
 AND NOT EXISTS (
 SELECT 1 FROM pg_indexes
 WHERE tablename = tc.table_name
 AND indexdef LIKE '%' || kcu.column_name || '%'
 );

Every FK column that is queried from the child side needs an index. Without it, deletes and joins on the parent produce sequential scans.

4. Validate migration file hygiene

# Migrations must be append-only; no editing of already-applied files
git log --oneline supabase/migrations/
git diff main -- supabase/migrations/ # should only show NEW files, never edits to old ones

Check that each migration file:

• Has a transaction wrapper (BEGIN/COMMIT) or uses supabase migrate which wraps automatically.
• Does not contain DROP TABLE or DROP COLUMN without a preceding backup/rename step.
• Does not add NOT NULL to an existing column in one step (see skill 37 for the safe pattern).

5. Review connection pooling configuration

In supabase/config.toml or project settings:

[db.pooler]
enabled = true
pool_mode = "transaction" # transaction mode for stateless APIs
default_pool_size = 15
max_client_conn = 100

• Transaction mode (pgBouncer): correct for serverless/edge functions. Session-level features (SET LOCAL, prepared statements, advisory locks) do NOT work in transaction mode.
• Session mode: required if using LISTEN/NOTIFY, advisory locks, or session variables. Verify the app does not mix modes.
• Check max_client_conn against your Supabase plan's connection limit. Exceeding it causes FATAL: remaining connection slots are reserved.

6. Inspect auth.users coupling

-- Profiles table should reference auth.users via FK
SELECT
 tc.table_name, kcu.column_name, ccu.table_name AS ref_table
FROM information_schema.table_constraints tc
JOIN information_schema.key_column_usage kcu ON tc.constraint_name = kcu.constraint_name
JOIN information_schema.constraint_column_usage ccu ON tc.constraint_name = ccu.constraint_name
WHERE ccu.table_name = 'users' AND ccu.table_schema = 'auth';

Confirm the profiles/user metadata table has:

id UUID REFERENCES auth.users(id) ON DELETE CASCADE

Missing ON DELETE CASCADE leaves orphaned rows when a user is deleted from Supabase Auth.

7. Run EXPLAIN ANALYZE on suspicious queries

EXPLAIN (ANALYZE, BUFFERS, FORMAT TEXT)
SELECT p.*, u.email
FROM posts p
JOIN auth.users u ON u.id = p.user_id
WHERE p.team_id = '00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000001'
ORDER BY p.created_at DESC
LIMIT 20;

Red flags: Seq Scan on large tables, Rows Removed by Filter much larger than actual rows, Buffers: shared hit=0 read=N (cold cache), nested loop with high actual rows.

Checklist

• All public tables have RLS enabled (rowsecurity = true)
• No policy uses bare true as qual for sensitive tables
• service_role client is never used client-side (browser/mobile)
• Every FK column on the child side has an index
• Migration files are append-only (no edits to historical files)
• NOT NULL additions go through expand-contract (see skill 37)
• pgBouncer mode matches the app's session feature usage
• auth.users FK has ON DELETE CASCADE where appropriate
• anon key is safe to expose; service_role key is in server env only
• EXPLAIN ANALYZE shows index scans, not sequential scans, on hot paths

Common issues & anti-patterns

RLS bypass via service_role in client code. Any JavaScript bundle that contains service_role key is a critical secret leak. Grep for it in next.config.js, .env.local committed to git, or Vite build output.

Policies that call functions with SECURITY DEFINER. A SECURITY DEFINER function runs as its owner (often postgres), bypassing RLS of tables it touches internally. Audit every function referenced in a policy.

Adding NOT NULL in a single migration step on a live table. Postgres takes an ACCESS EXCLUSIVE lock and rewrites the table. On millions of rows this causes downtime. Use ALTER COLUMN ... SET DEFAULT + backfill + SET NOT NULL + DROP DEFAULT across multiple deploys.

Querying auth.users directly from application code. Supabase exposes auth.users but it contains sensitive fields. Build a public.profiles view or table and expose only what you need with RLS.

Missing CONCURRENTLY on index creation in migrations. CREATE INDEX without CONCURRENTLY locks the table for writes. Use CREATE INDEX CONCURRENTLY in a migration that is NOT inside a transaction block (supabase migration new --no-transaction).

Sequence exhaustion on SERIAL columns. Use BIGSERIAL or UUID for tables expected to grow past 2 billion rows. Check current sequence values:

SELECT sequencename, last_value, max_value FROM pg_sequences WHERE schemaname = 'public';

Required output

Produce a structured report with:

1. RLS coverage table: list every public table, its rowsecurity status, and policy count per command.
2. Security findings: ranked Critical / High / Medium / Low with exact table/policy names.
3. Performance findings: missing indexes, sequential scans found, estimated row counts.
4. Migration hygiene: any edited historical files, unsafe DDL patterns.
5. Recommended SQL: ready-to-run corrective statements (wrapped in a transaction where safe).
6. Next safe command: the single most important action to take next.

Safety

• Never execute DROP, TRUNCATE, DELETE, or ALTER TABLE ... DROP COLUMN as part of the review.
• Never print or log service_role or anon keys found in files.
• Never modify migration files that have already been applied to any environment.
• All EXPLAIN ANALYZE runs are read-only and safe against production if you have read access.
• If you cannot determine whether a change is safe, recommend it with a warning rather than executing it.