PGConf India 2025 was a resounding success, with more than 525 Postgres enthusiasts in attendance—an impressive jump from 400 attendees at last year’s conference. This growth is a testament to the expanding PostgreSQL community in India. EDB VP and Postgres Evangelist, Bruce Momjian, was there to witness the excitement and innovation firsthand. Here are some of his key takeaways from the conference this year.
The Future of Open Source Databases
Bruce says one of the standout moments at PGConf India 2025 was hearing Peter Zaitsev from Percona discuss the evolution of open source databases in his keynote, PostgreSQL and the Future of Open Source Databases. Peter highlighted how good engineering alone is not enough—ease of use in the cloud, challenges with MySQL, and increased cloud vendor support have all contributed to PostgreSQL’s rising popularity. He also touched on the concept of data gravity, a topic Bruce has previously explored in his own blogs.
One of the funniest surprises at the conference was Peter Zaitsev’s slide on “generational transition,” which joked about the age of PostgreSQL’s senior leadership, and featured a photo of Bruce Momjian himself! Of course, it wasn’t a complete surprise to Bruce, who said “Peter got approval to use my picture for the slide, and I thought it was very effective. Even though I knew it was coming, I had a good laugh during the talk when I saw it.”
Bruce notes, “He also referred to me and some of the core team as white haired leadership, which I thought was funny. They didn't even say grey haired leadership, they said white haired!”
Of course, the “generational transition” slide was a total hit, with a lot of people coming up to Bruce after the presentation to talk about it. Bruce jokes that he is going to have a nightmare, and wake up screaming “generational transition!”
A Networking Powerhouse
Bruce was constantly engaged with attendees throughout the three-day conference, moving from one conversation to another. At one point he said to me, “This conference is a firehose of interactions”. A spot-on description of all the deep conversations, insights, and selfies that occurred each day.
Bruce also noted that conference attendees in India were exceptionally appreciative of his presentations, noting “I found the attendees at this India conference are far more likely than anywhere else to thank me for my presentations, videos, and blogs. Probably 10x more.” This experience is another testament to the growing enthusiasm for Postgres in the India market, as attendance at PGConf India continues to grow year after year.
Bruce says he found it particularly exciting to meet with representatives from two large companies interested in creating open source teams. Bruce helped connect them with industry veterans who have already established successful open source initiatives within their organizations. With Bruce’s vast network of Postgres experts, many of whom were in attendance at the conference, this is a perfect opportunity to connect newcomers to Postgres with the industry veterans they can learn from as they build the next generation of open source.
The networking opportunities at Postgres conferences are invaluable. They provide a unique space where newcomers can learn directly from PostgreSQL experts who have been working with the database for decades. Bruce emphasized that these events facilitate knowledge-sharing and mentorship for the next generation of database professionals. Although, sometimes the networking and problem-solving can get a little carried away. Bruce mentioned that one lengthy conversation with a PostgreSQL user from Russia led to an amusing realization—while they were deep in discussion, everyone else had already left for lunch!
Speaking of lunch, no trip to India would be complete without enjoying the local cuisine. Bruce raved about all the meals during the conference, noting “Breakfast is always amazing in India.” and “Indian food is so amazing. So many flavors on each dish, balanced perfectly”.
And of course, no Bruce sighting would be complete without his signature bowtie. He actually skipped the bowtie one day during PGConf India and got a lot of complaints and questions about “where is your bowtie?!”. The return of Bruce’s iconic accessory the next day was a relief to everyone. Although with India’s warm weather, a sport jacket was still out of the question, even for someone with Bruce’s sartorial dedication.
Addressing Technical Challenges
As is common at Postgres conferences and meetups, two different groups approached Bruce about PostgreSQL storage-related challenges. Bruce says the first group’s storage issue seemed to be related to using SSDs without a durable cache. And the second one is using a storage appliance that likely has a bug. As Bruce says, PGConfs offer many interesting opportunities to talk to people who are using Postgres about their discoveries, challenges, solutions, and innovations.
When talking about addressing bugs or corruption problems in the database, Bruce says “I emphasize the need for reliable hardware and hardware that is customized for database workloads. That's often not obvious to people. Database hardware needs are different from normal application hardware needs. I wrote my database hardware selection guidelines presentation to educate people on that requirement. I also have several blog entries on the topic, including one about power protection.”
Bruce also took part in a panel discussion titled “PostgreSQL & the AI Revolution: Community, Innovation, and the Future at PGConf India 2025” alongside EDB’s Tom Kincaid as well as Denis Lussier (pgEdge), Dr. Luigi Nardi (DBtune), and Madhusudan Baskaran from IITM Pravartak Technologies Foundation. Bruce shared his insights on how the PostgreSQL community contributes to the development of AI-related features and extensions. He also discussed what role the open source community can play in educating users on the effective use of PostgreSQL for AI applications.
Of course, Bruce’s talk “Securing PostgreSQL from External Attack” was a major hit among conference attendees, with a great turnout from Postgres enthusiasts eager to learn best practices for locking down your PostgreSQL database and eliminating common attack vectors. You can read more about Bruce’s talk and all our EDB speaker sessions, keynotes, and trainings in our PGConf India preview blog.
Final Thoughts
While Peter Zaitsev mentioned in his presentation that the current Postgres leadership is probably not going to be around for another 20 years, Bruce says “I guess time will tell. My father worked into his mid-80s.”
Bruce also notes that his wife says there's no retirement in the Bible, and therefore he doesn’t get to retire. Christine says, “And if you retire, what are you going to do? Travel and play on your computer? That's what you do now, so you might as well get paid for it.”
So with no imminent retirement planned, you can be sure to catch EDB’s Postgres Evangelist at a Postgres conference or meetup in a global city near you this year. Bruce is well known in the PostgreSQL community for his global travels, which you can read about on EDB’s blog and on momjian.us.
Thanks to everyone who made PGConf India 2025 such an incredible event, showcasing the strength of the PostgreSQL community and the ever-growing enthusiasm for open source databases. As PostgreSQL continues its rise, conferences like these will remain crucial hubs for collaboration, innovation, and, of course, great food and fun moments.