How to Migrate Heroku PostgreSQL to Redshift

Heroku PostgreSQL powers over 13 million applications. It is purpose-built for transactional workloads: fast writes, reliable reads, and seamless integration with application code. What it is not built for is analytics.

Running complex BI queries against a live Heroku Postgres database slows your application, strains compute resources, and still does not give your data team the columnar performance and petabyte-scale querying that Amazon Redshift delivers natively. The two systems are built for different jobs. The fix is to move the data, not force one tool to do both.

This post covers three methods to migrate Heroku PostgreSQL to Redshift in 2026. Each method is covered step by step, along with a comparison table to help you choose the right approach before diving into the details.

Prerequisites for Connecting Heroku PostgreSQL to Amazon Redshift 

Requirements vary by method. Here is everything to have in place before you start.

For all three methods:

• A Heroku account with an active PostgreSQL database on a paid plan. Note that Heroku eliminated its free tier in November 2022. All Heroku PostgreSQL plans are now paid.
• An Amazon Redshift cluster with an active database, schema, and sufficient storage for your data volume.
• An AWS IAM user or role with Redshift full access and S3 read/write permissions.
• Network connectivity between Heroku and AWS. Both run on AWS infrastructure, but SSL configuration is required for all direct connections.

For Method 1 (Hevo Data) only:

• A Hevo Data account. A 14-day free trial is available with no credit card required.
• Your Heroku PostgreSQL connection string, available under Settings > View Credentials in your Heroku dashboard.
• Your Redshift cluster endpoint, port, database name, and user credentials with CREATE TABLE and INSERT privileges.
• Basic familiarity with Hevo’s pipeline setup interface. No coding required.

For Method 2 (SSL-Validated Manual Connection) only:

• The Heroku PostgreSQL SSL certificate downloaded from your Heroku dashboard.
• PostgreSQL client tools installed locally: psql and pg_dump.
• An Amazon S3 bucket configured as a staging area for the dump file before loading into Redshift.
• Working knowledge of Redshift’s COPY command and S3 staging patterns.

For Method 3 (Non-Validating SSL Connection) only:

Note: This method bypasses SSL server certificate verification. It is not recommended for production workloads handling sensitive or regulated data.

PostgreSQL client tools installed locally: psql and pg_dump.

An Amazon S3 bucket configured as a staging area.

How to Migrate Heroku PostgreSQL to Redshift : 3 Methods

Amazon Redshift and Heroku Postgres are categorized as “Big Data as a Service” and “PostgreSQL as a Service” solutions.

Heroku is a cloud hosting platform that provides support and services to assist you with infrastructure management. Amazon Redshift is a cloud data warehouse service that processes, stores, and analyzes enormous amounts of data. Administrators create role-based permissions for all systems in your multi-cloud environment with Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift connection, offering one-click access to anything you need.

You can accomplish Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift connection using either of the three methods listed below:

• Method 1: Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift Using an Automated Data Pipeline Platform
• Method 2: Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift with SSL Validation
• Method 3: Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift without SSL Validation

Method 1: Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift Using an Automated Data Pipeline Platform

Hevo provides an Automated No-code Data Pipeline that helps you move your Heroku PostgreSQL data swiftly to Redshift. Hevo is fully-managed and completely automates the process of not only loading data from your desired source but also enriching the data and transforming it into an analysis-ready form without having to write a single line of code. Its fault-tolerant architecture ensures that the data is handled in a secure, consistent manner with zero data loss.

Manually mapping fields from source to destination, as mentioned in the previous method, is a time-consuming process. Hevo has a feature called Automapping that can help you avoid this hassle. When you enable Automapping, Hevo will automatically create a table in the destination and map it to the source.

It provides a consistent & reliable solution to manage data in real-time and always have analysis-ready data in your desired destination. It allows you to focus on key business needs and perform insightful analysis using BI tools.

You just need to follow a simple process to connect Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift using Hevo:

Step 1: Obtain PostgreSQL Database Credentials

• Log in to your Heroku account.
• Select the app containing the PostgreSQL database and open the databases dashboard.
• Access the DATA tab and click on the PostgreSQL database you want to use.

• Click Settings, and then, View Credentials.

• Use the credentials provided below while setting up your Heroku PostgreSQL Source in Hevo.

Step 2: Set up Amazon Redshift as a Destination

Perform the following steps to configure Amazon Redshift as a Destination in Hevo:

• Click DESTINATIONS in the Asset Palette.
• Click + CREATE in the Destinations List View.
• On the Add Destination page, select Amazon Redshift.
• In the Configure your Amazon Redshift Destination page, specify the following:

You can easily connect Quickbooks to Redshift using Hevo by following the steps outlined above!

Here are more reasons to try Hevo:

• Smooth Schema Management: Hevo takes away the tedious task of schema management & automatically detects the schema of incoming data and maps it to your schema in the desired Data Warehouse.
• Exceptional Data Transformations: Best-in-class & Native Support for Complex Data Transformation at fingertips. Code & No-code Fexibilty designed for everyone.
• Quick Setup: Hevo with its automated features, can be set up in minimal time. Moreover, with its simple and interactive UI, it is extremely easy for new customers to work on and perform operations.

Try Hevo to easily connect Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift!

SIGN UP HERE FOR A 14-DAY FREE TRIAL!

Method 2: Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift with SSL Validation

• Step 1: Creating a Heroku Database
• Step 2: Adding the RDS SSL Certificate for your Application
• Step 3: Dump and Load it on RDS
• Step 4: Testing Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift

Step 1: Creating a Heroku Database

If you want to give each app its database and credentials. To do so, you’ll use the psql binary to connect to the RDS instance remotely (make sure port 5432 on this instance is open for 0.0.0.0/0 via its security group):

#Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift 
$ psql -U $RDS_ROOT_USER -h $NAME.$ID.$DATACENTER.rds.amazonaws.com --dbname=postgresql

It will request your $ROOT_PASSWORD. On the RDS Dashboard, you can find your amazonaws.com URL, and the $ROOT_USER is the one you specified when you created this instance. If you leave this field blank when creating the RDS instance, the dbname is PostgreSQL.

Once connected, you can examine the existing databases and users:

#Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift
psql$ list
psql$ du

OK, let’s make a new user and a new database, granting this user full access. Assume your Heroku app is called whiteunicorn1234. To begin, run the following command on your laptop to generate a URL-friendly password:

$ openssl rand -base64 32 | tr -d '=/+'

Create a PG user and a dedicated database in the psql prompt. Do not simply copy and paste.

#Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift
psql$ create role whiteunicorn1234 with password 'PASTE_P'W'D_HERE' login;
psql$ create database whiteunicorn1234;
psql$ grant all on database whiteunicorn1234 to whiteunicorn1234;
psql$ q

Step 2: Adding RDS SSL Certificate for your Application

#Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift 
$ cd your_app
$ mkdir -p config
$ curl https://s3.amazonaws.com/rds-downloads/rds-combined-ca-bundle.pem > ./config/rds-combined-ca-bundle.pem
$ git add config/rds-combined-ca-bundle.pem
$ git commit -m "Add RDS certificate to app files"
$ git push heroku master

Step 3: Dump and Load it on RDS

This will force your application to go offline.

$ cd your_app
$ heroku maintenance:on
$ heroku pg:backups capture
$ curl -o /tmp/latest.dump `heroku pg:backups public-url`

Before changing the DATABASE URL environment variable on Heroku, the goal is to send all data stored on Heroku to Amazon RDS.

$ pg_restore --verbose --clean --no-acl --no-owner 
    -h $NAME.$ID.$DATACENTER.rds.amazonaws.com 
    -U whiteunicorn1234 
    -d whiteunicorn1234 
    /tmp/latest.dump

#Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift

This will prompt you for the whiteunicorn1234 password you generated earlier with the OpenSSL command.

To see if the pg restore command was successful, open a new psql prompt and run the following commands:

#Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift 

$ psql -U whiteunicorn1234 -h $NAME.$ID.$DATACENTER.rds.amazonaws.com
psql$ SELECT
        nspname AS schemaname,relname,reltuples
      FROM pg_class C
      LEFT JOIN pg_namespace N ON (N.oid = C.relnamespace)
      WHERE
        nspname NOT IN ('pg_catalog', 'information_schema') AND
        relkind='r'
      ORDER BY reltuples DESC;

Step 4: Testing Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift

You must destroy your Heroku Database on Heroku because Heroku does not allow you to override the DATABASE_URL. This can be frightening, so double-check that the pg_restore command worked.

#Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift 
$ heroku addons:destroy heroku-postgresql
$ heroku config:set 
    DATABASE_URL="postgres://whiteunicorn1234:$PASSWORD@$NAME.$ID.$DATACENTER.rds.amazonaws.com/whiteunicorn1234?sslca=config/rds-combined-ca-bundle.pem"
$ heroku maintenance:off

That’s it! The Heroku app seems to be using a PostgreSQL database on Amazon Redshift!

Method 3: Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift without SSL Validation

Create a data source connection that corresponds to the data source vendor if you want to connect to Heroku Postgres. In this case, you intend to work with PostgreSQL, so you must establish a connection to it.

SSL is required for the connection to Heroku Postgres (like above). However, to establish a successful SSL connection, you must first upload a certificate to your Heroku application. Each Heroku application requires its SSL certificate. See the Heroku SSL article for instructions on how to configure these certificates.

If you do not intend to add the certificate to the key store, you can use the NonValidatingFactory option to bypass server validation and establish an encrypted connection.

Comparing the 3 Methods: Which Heroku PostgreSQL to Redshift Approach Is Right for You? 

	Method 1: Hevo Data	Method 2: SSL-Validated Manual	Method 3: Non-Validating SSL
Best for	Teams needing continuous, automated data pipeline replication with built-in ETL data modeling support	One-time migrations with full SSL security	Quick one-time transfers where certificate management is not viable
Setup time	Under 5 minutes, no-code	Several hours, including SSL configuration	30 to 60 minutes
Technical skill required	None, fully no-code	Moderate: PostgreSQL, S3, and Redshift knowledge	Moderate: PostgreSQL and Amazon Redshift knowledge
Sync type	Real-time, continuous	Manual, one-time snapshot	Manual, one-time snapshot
Change data capture	Built-in	Not supported	Not supported
Schema mapping	Automatic	Manual	Manual
Data transformation	In-pipeline, drag-and-drop and Python	None, post-load only	None, post-load only
SSL security	Fully managed, encrypted	Full SSL with certificate validation	SSL without server certificate verification
Error handling	Automated alerts, row-level logs, auto-retry	Manual, no built-in alerting	Manual, no built-in alerting
Data lineage	Full pipeline lineage tracking	None	None
Maintenance	Zero, fully managed	High, repeat manually on every refresh	High, repeat manually on every refresh
Production ready	Yes	Yes	Not recommended for sensitive data
Cost	Paid, from $239/month (14-day free trial)	Free, AWS S3 and Redshift costs apply	Free, AWS S3 and Redshift costs apply

How to choose: 

Choose Hevo Data (Method 1) if you need continuous replication, low maintenance overhead, automatic schema handling, and near real-time analytics inside Amazon Redshift.

Choose Method 2 (SSL-validated manual migration) if you need a secure, one-time migration and are comfortable managing PostgreSQL dumps, S3 staging, and Redshift loading manually.

Choose Method 3 (non-validating SSL migration) if you need a quick one-time transfer in a lower-sensitivity environment where SSL certificate management is not feasible.

Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift Connection

You can set up Heroku PostgreSQL and transfer data from Heroku to Redshift in a variety of ways to perform insightful analysis. Before that, here are some benefits of Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift Connection:

• Easy Fetch: You can map a single Heroku Postgres table to multiple Amazon Redshift tables.
• Simple Complexity: It allows complex mathematical and string operations and conditions to be used for data mapping
• Lookup: Lookup mapping can be used to map target columns to values retrieved from other target objects based on the source data.
• Constant: When integrating data, you can use constant values to fill some Heroku Postgres fields that don’t have corresponding Amazon Redshift fields (or vice versa).

Conclusion

• Redshift is fantastic, but when selecting a data warehouse, you must sometimes optimize for different factors.
• Some people prefer RDBMSs that use similar SQL syntaxes, such as Google BigQuery, PostgreSQL, Snowflake, Microsoft Azure SQL Data Warehouse, or Panoply, which works with Redshift instances. Others opt for a data lake, such as Amazon S3 or Databricks’ Delta Lake.

FAQ on Heroku for PostgreSQL to Redshift