PostgreSQL Deadlock Monitoring Guide - Detection & Resolution

Deadlock Detection and Analysis

• What it measures: Identifies and tracks deadlock occurrences, blocked queries, and the specific queries causing blocking situations in PostgreSQL.
• Why it matters: Deadlocks occur when two or more transactions are waiting for each other to release locks, creating a circular dependency that prevents any from proceeding. This can cause application timeouts, failed transactions, and significant performance degradation. Monitoring deadlocks is crucial for maintaining database availability and transaction reliability.
• Ideal value & Best Practice:
  • Aim for zero deadlocks in production environments
  • Monitor the deadlocks metric in pg_stat_database
  • Set appropriate lock_timeout to prevent indefinite blocking
  • Implement application-level retry logic for deadlock victims
  • Use PostgreSQL's log_lock_waits to capture locking issues in logs
  • Regularly analyze transaction patterns to identify potential deadlock scenarios

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