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Subject: BUG #19400: Memory leak in checkpointer and startup processes on PostgreSQL 18
To: pgsql-bugs@lists.postgresql.org
From: PG Bug reporting form <noreply@postgresql.org>
Cc: raphael@atmotrack.fr
Reply-To: raphael@atmotrack.fr, pgsql-bugs@lists.postgresql.org
Date: Tue, 10 Feb 2026 15:28:38 +0000
Message-ID: <19400-c889fc7fffc7c658@postgresql.org>
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Archived-At: <https://www.postgresql.org/message-id/19400-c889fc7fffc7c658%40postgresql.org>
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The following bug has been logged on the website:

Bug reference:      19400
Logged by:          Raphael
Email address:      raphael@atmotrack.fr
PostgreSQL version: 18.1
Operating system:   Debian 13
Description:       =20

Hello,

I recently migrated my cluster with 3 dedicated servers to a new cluster. I
was running on PG12 and I am now on PG18.1.
I noticed an increasing memory usage on all of my 3 node, until at some
point there is no memory left and patroni crashes on the leader, leaving the
cluster with no available primary.
The cluster is a Data Warehouse type using TimescaleDB, ingesting approx. 1M
of time-serie a day.
It appears that the memory leak is affecting both the checkpointer and
startup (WAL replay) processes in PostgreSQL 18.0 and 18.1.
I never had such issue on the old cluster with PG12 and the server's
configuration and cluster usage are the same (except the upgrade of PG)

SYMPTOMS:
- Checkpointer process grows to 5.6GB RSS after 24 hours
- Startup process on replicas grows to 3.9GB RSS
- Memory growth rate: approximately 160-200MB per hour
- Eventually causes out-of-memory conditions

CONFIGURATION:
- PostgreSQL version: Initially 18.0, upgraded to 18.1 - same issue persists
- Platform: Debian 13
- TimescaleDB: 2.23.0
- Deployment: 3-node Patroni cluster with streaming replication
- WAL level: logical
- Hot standby enabled

SYSTEM RESOURCES:
RAM: 32GB
Proc: 12 core of Intel(R) Xeon(R) E-2386G 3.50GHz

KEY SETTINGS:
- wal_level: logical
- hot_standby: on
- max_wal_senders: 20
- max_replication_slots: 20
- wal_keep_size: 1GB
- shared_buffer: 8GB

WAL STATISTICS (over 7 days):
- Total WAL generated: 2.3TB (approximately 31GB/day)
- Replication lag: 0 bytes (replicas are caught up)
- No long-running transactions

MEMORY STATE AFTER 24 HOURS:
On primary:
  postgres checkpointer: 3.9GB RSS

On replicas:
  postgres checkpointer: 5.6GB RSS
  postgres startup recovering: 3.9GB RSS  <-- This is abnormal

TESTING PERFORMED:
- Disabled wal_log_hints: No effect
- Reduced timescaledb.max_background_workers from 16 to 4: No effect
- Increased checkpoint_timeout to 30min: No effect
- Increased max_wal_size to 4GB: No effect
- Checkpoint frequency is normal (5.99% requested vs timed)
- Upgraded from PostgreSQL 18.0 to 18.1: Same issue persists

The startup process consuming 3.9GB on replicas is particularly concerning,
as this process should not accumulate memory during normal WAL replay.

Here some output 4 days after starting Postgres, on the primary :
# ps aux --sort=3D-%mem | head -20
USER         PID %CPU %MEM    VSZ   RSS TTY      STAT START   TIME COMMAND
postgres   38762  0.0 24.9 8648868 8182260 ?     Ss   Feb06   2:42 postgres:
atmo_data: checkpointer
postgres   38763  0.0  8.3 8646992 2746188 ?     Ss   Feb06   1:08 postgres:
atmo_data: background writer
postgres   38759  0.0  4.5 8646728 1501344 ?     Ss   Feb06   0:24 postgres:
atmo_data: io worker 0
postgres   38760  0.0  2.9 8646728 976132 ?      Ss   Feb06   0:13 postgres:
atmo_data: io worker 1
postgres   38761  0.0  2.3 8646728 755948 ?      Ss   Feb06   0:07 postgres:
atmo_data: io worker 2

The same output on a replica :
# ps aux --sort=3D-%mem | head -20
USER         PID %CPU %MEM    VSZ   RSS TTY      STAT START   TIME COMMAND
postgres 2706473  0.0 25.2 8653612 8291200 ?     Ss   Feb06   5:09 postgres:
atmo_data: checkpointer
postgres 2706475  0.2 23.8 8656016 7802324 ?     Ss   Feb06  14:41 postgres:
atmo_data: startup recovering 0000001E0000024500000075

Replica :
=3D# SELECT
    name,
    pg_size_pretty(total_bytes) as total,
    pg_size_pretty(used_bytes) as used,
    pg_size_pretty(free_bytes) as free
FROM pg_backend_memory_contexts
ORDER BY total_bytes DESC
LIMIT 30;
               name               |   total    |    used    |    free
----------------------------------+------------+------------+------------
 CacheMemoryContext               | 512 kB     | 483 kB     | 29 kB
 TopMemoryContext                 | 214 kB     | 192 kB     | 23 kB
 MessageContext                   | 128 kB     | 39 kB      | 89 kB
 Timezones                        | 102 kB     | 99 kB      | 2672 bytes
 GUCMemoryContext                 | 64 kB      | 55 kB      | 9248 bytes
 WAL record construction          | 49 kB      | 43 kB      | 6400 bytes
 ExecutorState                    | 48 kB      | 39 kB      | 9104 bytes
 TupleSort main                   | 32 kB      | 25 kB      | 6848 bytes
 ExprContext                      | 32 kB      | 26 kB      | 5832 bytes
 TransactionAbortContext          | 32 kB      | 240 bytes  | 32 kB
 tuplestore tuples                | 32 kB      | 19 kB      | 13 kB
 GUC hash table                   | 32 kB      | 24 kB      | 8600 bytes
 smgr relation table              | 32 kB      | 15 kB      | 17 kB
 Type information cache           | 24 kB      | 21 kB      | 2672 bytes
 Custom Scan Methods              | 16 kB      | 9664 bytes | 6720 bytes
 PgStat Pending                   | 16 kB      | 9112 bytes | 7272 bytes
 pg_get_backend_memory_contexts   | 16 kB      | 10 kB      | 5664 bytes
 Relcache by OID                  | 16 kB      | 12 kB      | 3608 bytes
 PgStat Shared Ref Hash           | 9264 bytes | 8552 bytes | 712 bytes
 Record information cache         | 8192 bytes | 6552 bytes | 1640 bytes
 RowDescriptionContext            | 8192 bytes | 1272 bytes | 6920 bytes
 Hypertable cache                 | 8192 bytes | 504 bytes  | 7688 bytes
 ErrorContext                     | 8192 bytes | 240 bytes  | 7952 bytes
 Rendezvous variable hash         | 8192 bytes | 7576 bytes | 616 bytes
 search_path processing cache     | 8192 bytes | 2552 bytes | 5640 bytes
 Cache pins                       | 8192 bytes | 240 bytes  | 7952 bytes
 fn telemetry local function hash | 8192 bytes | 6168 bytes | 2024 bytes
 TopTransactionContext            | 8192 bytes | 416 bytes  | 7776 bytes
 MdSmgr                           | 8192 bytes | 352 bytes  | 7840 bytes
 PrivateRefCount                  | 8192 bytes | 5520 bytes | 2672 bytes

My not-so-good workaround is to perform a daily restart of the cluster
members to avoid breaking patroni on the primary.

Please let me know if you need any additional information to investigate
this issue