How to estimate disk space requirements?

Started by Bryan Field-Elliotalmost 25 years ago3 messagesgeneral
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#1Bryan Field-Elliot
bryan_lists@netmeme.org

I have an application for PostgreSQL which may create some pretty huge
databases. I need some way to estimate how much physical disk space will
be required. I know the exact record structure and indexing schemes to
be used, and a rough idea of the number of rows I'll need. Given that,
how can I determine the physical disk space requirements?

Thanks in advance,

Bryan

#2Peter Eisentraut
peter_e@gmx.net
In reply to: Bryan Field-Elliot (#1)
Re: How to estimate disk space requirements?

Bryan Field-Elliot writes:

I have an application for PostgreSQL which may create some pretty huge
databases. I need some way to estimate how much physical disk space will
be required. I know the exact record structure and indexing schemes to
be used, and a rough idea of the number of rows I'll need. Given that,
how can I determine the physical disk space requirements?

There is some info in the FAQ. You should estimate roughly five times the
size of the data in flat text.

--
Peter Eisentraut peter_e@gmx.net http://funkturm.homeip.net/~peter

#3Tom Lane
tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us
In reply to: Bryan Field-Elliot (#1)
Re: How to estimate disk space requirements?

Bryan Field-Elliot <bryan_lists@netmeme.org> writes:

I have an application for PostgreSQL which may create some pretty huge
databases. I need some way to estimate how much physical disk space will
be required. I know the exact record structure and indexing schemes to
be used, and a rough idea of the number of rows I'll need. Given that,
how can I determine the physical disk space requirements?

It'd probably be easier to discuss this with a concrete example in hand.
How about you give us your info --- specific column datatypes, indexes
to be created, estimated update rate (so we can guess how many dead
tuples you might have at any given time).

regards, tom lane