Company
Date Published
Author
Elvis Pranskevichus
Word count
851
Language
English
Hacker News points
None

Summary

asyncpg is an open-source Python client library specifically designed for PostgreSQL, built to leverage Python's asyncio and async/await features, making it particularly suitable for high-performance, low-latency database access. Unlike psycopg2, asyncpg supports the PostgreSQL binary I/O protocol, offering better handling of complex data types such as arrays and composites, and extensively uses prepared statements to optimize query performance. Its design, rooted in Cython with efficient buffer management, allows asyncpg to achieve significant speed improvements, being at least three times faster than psycopg2. The library has no dependencies, simplifying deployment, and provides pre-built binary wheels for major operating systems. Benchmarks demonstrate asyncpg's superior performance in query throughput and latency, highlighting its potential for building scalable systems in Python.