# ParadeDB

13 Hacker News commenters recommended ParadeDB and 1 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 8 of 13 months. It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** Free open-source Postgres extension for BM25 full-text search, offering an alternative to Elasticsearch. One critic reported instability and data corruption.

## Why people recommend it

- Full-text search inside Postgres (3 comments): "You get a proper relational database but also proper fts without having to deal with elastic etc." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50094651)) "delivers state-of-the-art search in Postgres" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47979550)) "ParadeDB is a pair of postgres plugins." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47324619))
- Replaces Elasticsearch for search (2 comments): "You get a proper relational database but also proper fts without having to deal with elastic etc." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50094651)) "We solve three problems with Elasticsearch today" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46114849))
- Works alongside pgvector for hybrid search (2 comments): "ParadeDB's full-text search combined with pgvector gives you both primitives" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47254784)) "You can use pgvector for the vector lookup and paradedb for bm25." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46633944))
- Responsive, well-regarded core team (2 comments): "One-click deploy with Render, and we're directly in contact with the core team to get it added to their official docs." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47222146)) "ParadeDB is a great team, highly recommend using" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46244803))

## What people warn about

- Index settings need tuning (1 comments): "the ParadeDB index settings need some tuning" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47215920))
- Replication stalled for some users (1 comments): "my pg cluster stopped replicating" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50300498))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [pgvector](https://hackerapproved.com/p/pgvector.md): 55 recommend
- [PostGIS](https://hackerapproved.com/p/postgis.md): 20 recommend
- [pg_lake](https://hackerapproved.com/p/pg-lake.md): 18 recommend
- [pg_textsearch](https://hackerapproved.com/p/pg-textsearch.md): 10 recommend
- [Tin full-text search for Postgres](https://hackerapproved.com/p/tin.md): 10 recommend

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "ParadeDB", https://hackerapproved.com/p/paradedb/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).