AWS RDS Postgres connection failure

Question

I am getting started on AWS RDS. I am trying to create a public PostgreSQL instance (free tier) and trying to connect from my local laptop through SQL Workbench. I am following the instructions from this https://aws.amazon.com/getting-started/tutorials/create-connect-postgresql-db/

But, when I try to connect from SQL Workbench, I get "connection attempt failed" error. I have verified the steps, host name, port, dbname to make sure I am not missing any. I am still unable connect from SQL Workbench.

Do I have to take care of any other configurations? Is there a way to debug if the rds db instance is reachable (ping/telnet)? Appreciate any help with this. Thank you!

check the security groups if the port is open – dassum Dec 16 '19 at 17:01 — dassum, Dec 16 '19 at 17:01

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 17 '19 at 00:07

2

You should check the following on the Amazon RDS instance:

It is set to publicly accessible
It is in a public subnet
It has a security group configured to permit inbound access from your IP address on port 3306
Your local network is not blocking the connection (try it from home, or tethered via your phone)

answered Dec 17 '19 at 00:07

John Rotenstein

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Thank you! Looks like it is my local network. Trying from another machine, which is not in network, worked. Is there a way to know what settings in my network blocks it? – Jesu Benin Dec 18 '19 at 22:45
It might also be blocked on your local computer itself (firewall settings). You'll have to speak with your Network Admins to figure it out. – John Rotenstein Dec 18 '19 at 22:47
Thanks, this helped me! For RDS>Databases>PostgreSQL, enabled - publicly accessible, set the same security group with my EC2>Instances, then added port 5432 (automatically determined by PostgreSQL) for all IPv4 - 0.0.0.0/0, in the used security group – Алексей Добров May 17 '22 at 08:13

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 16 '19 at 17:00

1

SQL Workbench was a MySQL client GUI last time I checked. So it is not surprising if it cannot connect to a database forked from PostgreSQL.

Try psql or some other PostgreSQL client software.

answered Dec 16 '19 at 17:00

Laurenz Albe

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I tried in pgAdmin4 also! pgAdmin also says, Unable to connect to server: timeout expired – Jesu Benin Dec 16 '19 at 17:25

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Jan 27 '23 at 21:13

I had two issues I had to fix to make it work:

I was reusing a security group previously configured for MySQL and it had only MySQL port configured. I had to add a rule for Postgres port. It seems to be a pretty common issue mentioned in other answers for rds connectivity. That has fixed timeout but did not fix connectivity in general.
One more issue I haven't seen anywhere - I was trying to use a custom "Master username". That didn't work. But when I left a default "postgres" value - I was able to connect.

AWS RDS Postgres connection failure

3 Answers3

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