---
title: 'Quick tip: Here''s how to uninstall Postgres from your Mac'
date: 2019-03-19
excerpt: 'Uninstalling Postgres database software from a computer running MacOS isn''t super straightforward - this is what I found helpful.'
tags: [dev]
canonical: https://mikebifulco.com/posts/quick-tip-uninstall-postgres-from-your-mac
---
# Quick tip: Here's how to uninstall Postgres from your Mac

# The Problem

Earlier tonight, my Macbook Pro decided it was done having disk space, and in the middle of a Time Machine backup, it started gnawing through every last bit of free space I had left.  Great.

In a frenzy of panic-and-uninstall, I came across an install of [Postgres](https://www.postgresql.org/) 9.x which I haven't used in quite a long time.   I wanted to carefully uninstall it, in part because I knew that the Postgres install process does loads of not-easy-to-clean things to your mac, including adding a user account to your device, and an app, and a bunch of settings.

My goodness, what a ride.

# The Solution

There's not a simple uninstaller for *everything*, so far as I can tell.

Eventually, the gods of web search brought me to [this beautiful gist](https://gist.github.com/Atlas7/b1a40a2ffd85728b33e7) on GitHub, which listed everything I needed to do to complete the uninstall safely. (I've also [forked](https://gist.github.com/mbifulco/1e44a2e9b7e3bd784f01ef5a138da829) the gist, in case the original ever disappears 😅).

I don't want to take any credit for the work - it seems to have originally come from [this blog post](https://hzchirs-blog.logdown.com/posts/142678-how-completely-uninstall-postgresql-9x-on-mac-osx) from 2013, which was not returned by my Bing-fu (yeah, you read that right).  

I'm posting it here in the hopes that will help some other soul in the future who is going through this experience.  Good luck out there!

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---

Written by Mike Bifulco. Originally published at https://mikebifulco.com/posts/quick-tip-uninstall-postgres-from-your-mac