N8N data is not stored in Postgres

Questions
, ,
1

I just installed n8n using docker compose below

version: ‘3.8’
volumes:
db_storage:
n8n_storage:
redis_storage:
x-shared: &shared
restart: always
environment:
- DB_TYPE=postgresdb
- DB_POSTGRESDB_HOST=postgres
- DB_POSTGRESDB_PORT=5432
- DB_POSTGRESDB_DATABASE=${POSTGRES_DB}
- DB_POSTGRESDB_USER=${POSTGRES_NON_ROOT_USER}
- DB_POSTGRESDB_PASSWORD=${POSTGRES_NON_ROOT_PASSWORD}
- EXECUTIONS_MODE=queue
- EXECUTIONS_PROCESS=main
- QUEUE_BULL_REDIS_HOST=redis
- QUEUE_HEALTH_CHECK_ACTIVE=true
links:
- postgres
- redis
volumes:
- n8n_storage:/home/node/.n8n
depends_on:
redis:
condition: service_healthy
postgres:
condition: service_healthy
services:
postgres:
image: postgres:11
container_name: n8n-postgres
restart: always
environment:
- POSTGRES_USER
- POSTGRES_PASSWORD
- POSTGRES_DB
- POSTGRES_NON_ROOT_USER
- POSTGRES_NON_ROOT_PASSWORD
volumes:
- db_storage:/var/lib/postgresql/data
- ./init-data.sh:/docker-entrypoint-initdb.d/init-data.sh
healthcheck:
test: [‘CMD-SHELL’, ‘pg_isready -h localhost -U ${POSTGRES_USER} -d ${POSTGRES_DB}’]
interval: 5s
retries: 10
ports:
- 5432:5432
redis:
image: redis:6-alpine
container_name: n8n-redis
restart: always
volumes:
- redis_storage:/data
healthcheck:
test: [‘CMD’, ‘redis-cli’, ‘ping’]
interval: 5s
timeout: 5s
retries: 10
ports:
- 5433:6379
n8n:
<<: *shared
image: docker.n8n.io/n8nio/n8n
container_name: n8n
environment:
- GENERIC_TIMEZONE=Asia/Jakarta
- EXECUTIONS_TIMEOUT=3600
- EXECUTIONS_TIMEOUT_MAX=7200
- WEBHOOK_URL=https://webhook.local/
- N8N_METRICS=true
- EXECUTIONS_DATA_SAVE_ON_ERROR=all
- EXECUTIONS_DATA_SAVE_ON_SUCCESS=none
- EXECUTIONS_DATA_SAVE_ON_PROGRESS=true
- EXECUTIONS_DATA_SAVE_MANUAL_EXECUTIONS=false
- EXECUTIONS_DATA_PRUNE=true
- EXECUTIONS_DATA_MAX_AGE=168
- EXECUTIONS_DATA_PRUNE_MAX_COUNT=50000
command: /bin/sh -c “n8n start --tunnel”
ports:
- 5431:5678
n8n-worker:
<<: *shared
image: docker.n8n.io/n8nio/n8n
container_name: n8n-worker
command: /bin/sh -c “sleep 5; n8n worker”
ports:
- 5434:5678
depends_on:
- n8n

and this setting for .env file

POSTGRES_USER=user
POSTGRES_PASSWORD=xxxxxxxx
POSTGRES_DB=user
POSTGRES_NON_ROOT_USER=user
POSTGRES_NON_ROOT_PASSWORD=xxxxx

Then I tried to access the postgres n8n database but couldn’t find any data like workflow_entity which was empty. even though we already have 6 workflows running.

Why this happened? Is there an error in the installation that I did? if yes, please provide information.

Does the data stay in SQLite because it defaults to that?

Thank You

  • n8n version: 0.236.0
  • **Database (default: SQLite): **
  • n8n EXECUTIONS_PROCESS setting (default: own, main): Main
  • Running n8n via (Docker, npm, n8n cloud, desktop app): Docker
  • Operating system: Ubuntu 22
2

Hey @rusdiaman,

It sounds like the shared env options have not been passed through to the instance, Have you checked to see if they are set in the container? What I tend to do when setting up n8n is first set up one instance to point to the database then add the queue mode options once I have confirmed it is working in a basic state.

3

Hi @Jon ,
sorry for late reply.

how i can check “ther are set in the container” ?
Sorry i’m new in docker.

for now I’m trying the local suggestions you gave.
Thank you

4

Hey @rusdiaman,

You could run something like docker exec n8n /bin/sh -c /usr/bin/env and see what that outputs, If you are new to Docker though I would definitely start off with an easier set up so you can get your head around how everything sits together then make it more complex.