OpenAI is running ChatGPT for ~800 million users on PostgreSQL — and according to their own disclosures, it’s actually working.
In this episode of the Platform Engineering Playbook Daily Podcast, we break down how PostgreSQL was pushed to hyperscale, the architectural tradeoffs behind a single-primary model, and the operational playbook that makes this kind of scale possible.
This isn’t a generic “Postgres is great” story. It’s a real-world look at what it takes to run open-source databases at extreme scale, and what platform engineers can learn from it.
⏱️ Episode Timeline
00:31 – Intro
00:54 – Deep Dive (Part 1): Why PostgreSQL at Hyperscale
05:55 – Deep Dive (Part 2): Architecture & Scaling Patterns
10:54 – Deep Dive (Part 3): The Platform Engineering Playbook
16:02 – News
18:57 – Outro
🧠 Key Takeaways
•PostgreSQL can scale far beyond “mid-size” workloads
•Sharding, pooling, and operational discipline matter more than database choice
•Open-source databases reduce vendor lock-in at hyperscale
•Engineering expertise can outperform enterprise licensing
If you’re designing or operating large-scale systems, this episode breaks down what actually matters when scaling relational databases.
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Links and sources discussed are in the show notes.
https://openai.com/index/scaling-postgresql/
Title: Scaling PostgreSQL to power 800 million ChatGPT users
NEWS SOURCES:
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[1] https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/northrop-grumman-scales-enterprise-kubernetes-ai-and-hybrid-cloud-red-hat-openshift
Title: Northrop Grumman scales enterprise Kubernetes for AI and hybrid cloud with Red Hat OpenShift
[2] https://www.env0.com/blog/best-infrastructure-as-code-tools-and-terraform-alternatives
Title: Top Infrastructure as Code Tools and Terraform Alternatives
[3] https://dev.to/polliog/i-replaced-redis-with-postgresql-and-its-faster-4942
Title: I replaced Redis with PostgreSQL (and it's faster)
[4] https://thenewstack.io/cto-chris-aniszczyk-on-the-cncf-push-for-ai-interoperability/
Title: CTO Chris Aniszczyk on the CNCF push for AI interoperability
[5] https://opentelemetry.io/blog/2026/obi-goals/
Title: OpenTelemetry eBPF Instrumentation 2026 Goals
