Connect from any application

When connecting to Neon from an application or client, you connect to a database in your Neon project. In Neon, a database belongs to a branch, which may be the primary branch of your project (main) or a child branch.

You can obtain the database connection details you require from the Connection Details widget on the Neon Dashboard. Select a branch, a compute, a database, and a role. A connection string is constructed for you.

Neon supports pooled and direct connections to the database. Use a pooled connection string if your application uses a high number of concurrent connections. For more information, see Connection pooling.

A Neon connection string includes the role, password, hostname, and database name.

postgres://alex:AbC123dEf@ep-cool-darkness-123456.us-east-2.aws.neon.tech/dbname
           ^    ^         ^                                               ^
     role -|    |         |- hostname                                     |- database
                |
                |- password

You can use the details from the connection string or the connection string itself to configure a connection. For example, you might place the connection details in an .env file, assign the connection string to a variable, or pass the connection string on the command-line.

.env file:

PGUSER=alex
PGHOST=ep-cool-darkness-123456.us-east-2.aws.neon.tech
PGDATABASE=dbname
PGPASSWORD=AbC123dEf
PGPORT=5432

Variable:

DATABASE_URL="postgres://alex:AbC123dEf@ep-cool-darkness-123456.us-east-2.aws.neon.tech/dbname"

Command-line:

psql postgres://alex:AbC123dEf@ep-cool-darkness-123456.us-east-2.aws.neon.tech/dbname

Where do I obtain a password?

It's included in your Neon connection string, which you can find on the Neon Dashboard, in the Connection Details widget.

What port does Neon use?

Neon uses the default Postgres port, 5432.

Connection examples

The Connection Details widget on the Neon Dashboard also provides connection examples for different programming languages and application frameworks, constructed for the branch, database, and role that you select.

See our Framework, language, and platform guides for more connection examples.

Network protocol support

Neon supports both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses.

Additionally, Neon provides a serverless driver that supports both WebSocket and HTTP connections. For further information, refer to our Neon serverless driver documentation.

Connection notes

• Some older client libraries and drivers, including older psql executables, are built without Server Name Indication (SNI) support and require a workaround. For more information, see Connection errors.
• Some Java-based tools that use the pgJDBC driver for connecting to Postgres, such as DBeaver, DataGrip, and CLion, do not support including a role name and password in a database connection string or URL field. When you find that a connection string is not accepted, try entering the database name, role, and password values in the appropriate fields in the tool's connection UI when configuring a connection to Neon. For examples, see Connect a GUI or IDE.