PostGIS
Hacker ApprovedRanked 2 of 14 Postgres extensions by recommenders
People recommend PostGIS for storing, indexing and querying geospatial data inside PostgreSQL, citing speed at scale and a feature-packed set of functions.
People recommend PostGIS for storing, indexing and querying geospatial data inside PostgreSQL, citing speed at scale and a feature-packed set of functions.
23 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 20
- criticize it
- 3
- approval share
- 87%
Recommended in 8 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it carries the badge
- 20 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 6.7 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 8 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Fast spatial indexing at scale
“postgres PostGIS index for location finding scaled well enough for Uber”
Comment from 25 Jul 2026 in “Postgres LISTEN/NOTIFY actually scales” “mainly for its speed at scale and spatial indexing”
Comment from 7 Feb 2026 in “How we made geo joins 400× faster with H3 indexes” Powerful, feature-packed geospatial tool
“PostGIS should be the standard for anything geospatial, such feature packed”
Comment from 12 Jan 2026 in “Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (January 2026)” “very useful addition for storing, indexing, and querying geospatial data”
Comment from 19 Aug 2026 in “PostgreSQL for Everything” “Together with PostGIS, it's a powerful tool.”
Comment from 7 Mar 2026 in “QGIS 4.0” Fits mapping and spatial analysis work
“Linking SagaGIS with PostGIS to do pre/post wildfire analysis was my jam.”
Comment from 8 May 2026 in “GeoJSON” “PostGIS is arguably a better match for what this project is doing”
Comment from 25 Jun 2026 on Hacker News “It got PostgreSQL+PostGIS (it's a mapping app), that's it.”
Comment from 24 Jun 2026 in “PostgreSQL Is Enough”
Other Postgres extensions people recommend
The four most recommended other Postgres extensions, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| pgvector | 55 | 20 | 73% | 10 | — | Approved |
| PostGISThis page | 20 | 3 | 87% | 8 | — | Approved |
| pg_lake | 18 | 3 | 86% | 5 | — | Approved |
| ParadeDB | 13 | 1 | 93% | 8 | — | Approved |
| pg_textsearch | 10 | 0 | 100% | 7 | — | Approved |
What people said
20 of the 24 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“excellent plugins like pgvector and PostGIS”
“very useful addition for storing, indexing, and querying geospatial data”
“No mention of https://postgis.net/ - shameful”
“I honestly don't use geography that much because it only supports a subset of the geometry functions.”
“postgres PostGIS index for location finding scaled well enough for Uber”
“This is why I personally store data in local PostGIS.”
“PostGIS is arguably a better match for what this project is doing”
“other special types like in Postgis cover other use cases”
“It got PostgreSQL+PostGIS (it's a mapping app), that's it.”
“We use that exact function”
“Linking SagaGIS with PostGIS to do pre/post wildfire analysis was my jam.”
“It is not really a software project, but a detail about how the earth coordinates are calculated”
“Together with PostGIS, it's a powerful tool.”
“mainly for its speed at scale and spatial indexing”
“an old fashioned postgis server is the simplest solution sometimes”
“I'm guessing the author is using something like postgresql which of course has similar geospatial indexing support via post gis.”
“PostGIS took multiple days to process the million-vertex Norwegian national parks”
“PostGIS should be the standard for anything geospatial, such feature packed”
“learning all the magic of PostGIS”
“the topology component won't configure to not use the system /usr/bin/postgres and has given me a lot of grief”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.