Concepts

Understand how MotherDuck works, the serverless cloud data warehouse built on DuckDB. These pages explain the mental model behind the platform: hypertenancy, Dual Execution, storage lifecycle, and access control, so you know not just what to do but why it works the way it does.

Architecture and capabilities

MotherDuck's serverless architecture combines cloud scale with DuckDB's efficiency through a hypertenancy model.

Database Concepts

MotherDuck Database Concepts

Hypertenancy

Learn how MotherDuck's hypertenancy model provides dedicated compute for every user through per-user Ducklings, enabling predictable performance without noisy neighbors.

Resource management

Understand MotherDuck's resource hierarchy, from organizations, accounts, tokens, and secrets down to databases and tables, and how each level provides compute isolation, data isolation, and access control.

Security and compliance

Overview of MotherDuck's security features including encryption, authentication, access control, network security, and compliance certifications.

Database Snapshots

Understand how snapshots work in MotherDuck, including retention, restore, snapshot management, and plan availability

pg_duckdb Extension

Use pg_duckdb to run DuckDB analytics within PostgreSQL and connect to MotherDuck.

Role-based access control (RBAC)

Understand MotherDuck roles, including preset and custom roles, how platform privileges and data grants combine, and how permissions resolve.

Storage Lifecycle and Management

Understand how MotherDuck manages data storage across different lifecycle stages and how this affects your billing and data management strategies.

Data Recovery

Understand MotherDuck's data recovery mechanisms

Flights

How Flights run scheduled Python next to your MotherDuck data, and when to reach for one instead of SQL, a Dive, or an external orchestrator.

Workload scaling patterns

Choose the right compute size, scaling approach, and connection model for your MotherDuck workload using a decision flowchart and workload-to-pattern matrix.

Where code runs

Choose a local DuckDB client, MotherDuck cloud SQL, or a Flight based on the extensions, credentials, and schedule your workload needs.

Object name resolution

Fully qualified naming conventions and database resolution rules in MotherDuck.

DuckDB Extensions in MotherDuck

Supported DuckDB extensions for the MotherDuck cloud service, Web UI, and CLI.

DuckLake

Understanding DuckLake - A high-performance open table format for petabyte-scale analytics