Supabase Administration Expert

Master Supabase schema design, Row Level Security policies, migrations, and performance optimization for production applications.

Decision Points

1. RLS Pattern Selection

Check data sensitivity & access patterns:
├── Public content (blogs, docs)
│   └── Use: Public read + owner write policies
├── User-owned data (profiles, settings)
│   └── Use: Owner-only access (auth.uid() = user_id)
├── Multi-tenant (org data)
│   ├── Small orgs (<1000 users): RLS with org_id filter
│   └── Large orgs (>1000 users): Schema per tenant
└── Admin content (system config)
    └── Use: Role-based policies with profiles.role check

2. Delete Strategy Decision Tree

Evaluate data retention needs:
├── Needs audit trail or recovery?
│   ├── High compliance: Soft delete (deleted_at timestamp)
│   └── Medium compliance: Soft delete + cascade trigger
├── Performance critical with large volume?
│   ├── Yes: Hard delete with CASCADE
│   └── No: Soft delete acceptable
└── Referenced by other tables?
    ├── Critical refs: Use ON DELETE RESTRICT
    └── Clean cascade: Use ON DELETE CASCADE

3. Migration Risk Assessment

Check change impact:
├── Schema changes
│   ├── Adding nullable column: Low risk, deploy anytime
│   ├── Adding NOT NULL: Medium risk, needs backfill
│   └── Dropping column: High risk, needs staged deployment
├── RLS policy changes
│   ├── Relaxing permissions: Low risk
│   └── Restricting access: High risk, test with real data
└── Index changes
    ├── Creating index: Use CONCURRENTLY flag
    └── Dropping index: Check query performance impact first

Failure Modes

Schema Bloat Anti-Pattern

Symptoms: Tables with 20+ columns, nullable columns everywhere, poor query performance Detection: SELECT count(*) FROM information_schema.columns WHERE table_name = 'bloated_table' returns >15 Fix: Normalize into related tables, use JSONB for flexible attributes, add NOT NULL constraints with defaults

RLS Performance Killer

Symptoms: Queries taking >1000ms, high CPU on simple selects, missing auth.uid() in WHERE clauses Detection: EXPLAIN ANALYZE shows sequential scans on user_id columns without indexes Fix: Add CREATE INDEX idx_table_user_id ON table(user_id) for every RLS-filtered column

Migration Lock Hell

Symptoms: Deployment timeouts, blocked writes during migration, "relation does not exist" errors Detection: Migration contains ALTER TABLE ADD COLUMN x NOT NULL without DEFAULT Fix: Split into: 1) Add nullable column with default, 2) Backfill data, 3) Add NOT NULL constraint

JWT Parsing Overload

Symptoms: RLS policies calling auth.uid() for every row, poor performance on large tables Detection: Policy has auth.uid() = user_id in USING clause without subquery Fix: Rewrite as user_id = (SELECT auth.uid()) to parse JWT once per query

Cascade Confusion

Symptoms: Data disappearing unexpectedly, orphaned records, referential integrity errors Detection: Foreign keys without explicit ON DELETE behavior, surprise empty result sets Fix: Explicitly set ON DELETE CASCADE/RESTRICT/SET NULL based on business logic

Worked Examples

Multi-Tenant RLS with Performance Optimization

Scenario: SaaS app where users belong to organizations, need org-isolated data

Step 1: Schema Design Decision

-- Decision: Use org_id column vs separate schemas
-- Trade-off: RLS filtering vs complete isolation
-- Choice: RLS (easier ops, shared resources)

CREATE TABLE posts (
  id uuid PRIMARY KEY DEFAULT gen_random_uuid(),
  org_id uuid NOT NULL REFERENCES organizations(id),
  user_id uuid NOT NULL REFERENCES auth.users(id),
  content text NOT NULL,
  created_at timestamptz DEFAULT now()
);

Step 2: Index Strategy (Critical for Performance)

-- Compound index: org_id first (highest selectivity for RLS)
CREATE INDEX idx_posts_org_user ON posts(org_id, user_id);
-- Single index for user lookups
CREATE INDEX idx_posts_user ON posts(user_id);

Step 3: RLS Policy with Org Context

-- Get user's org_id from profiles table
CREATE POLICY "Org members only" ON posts
  FOR ALL USING (
    org_id = (
      SELECT profiles.org_id 
      FROM profiles 
      WHERE profiles.id = auth.uid()
    )
  );

Step 4: Performance Validation

-- Test query performance
EXPLAIN ANALYZE 
SELECT * FROM posts 
WHERE org_id = 'test-org-id' 
LIMIT 10;
-- Should show Index Scan, not Seq Scan
-- Should be <100ms for tables with <1M rows

Expert Insight: Novices miss the compound index ordering. They create (user_id, org_id) which forces RLS to scan all user posts then filter by org. Experts put org_id first since RLS filters by org membership.

Quality Gates

RLS audit checklist - all must pass before production:

• All user tables have ALTER TABLE x ENABLE ROW LEVEL SECURITY
• Every auth.uid() reference has corresponding index on user_id column
• RLS policies tested with SET ROLE anon and real user JWTs
• EXPLAIN ANALYZE shows Index Scan (not Seq Scan) for auth queries
• Policy queries execute in <100ms with production data volume
• Migration tested on copy of production data (not empty dev DB)
• No ALTER TABLE ADD COLUMN x NOT NULL without DEFAULT in single transaction
• Foreign key constraints have explicit ON DELETE behavior (not default)
• Full-text search uses GIN indexes, not LIKE queries
• Auth triggers handle edge cases (profile creation failures, duplicate emails)

NOT-FOR Boundaries

Do NOT use this skill for:

• Supabase Auth UI styling/configuration → Use Supabase dashboard documentation
• Edge Functions development → Use cloudflare-worker-dev skill instead
• Client-side Supabase SDK → Use official Supabase JavaScript docs
• General PostgreSQL optimization → Use postgresql-dba skill for non-Supabase context
• Real-time subscriptions setup → Use Supabase Realtime documentation
• Storage bucket policies → Use Supabase Storage documentation

When to delegate:

• Complex analytical queries → postgresql-dba skill
• Frontend integration → Framework-specific skills
• DevOps deployment → docker-deployment or kubernetes-ops skills

Imported bundle navigation

These preserved source files add depth when their stated topic is needed.

• references/rls-patterns.md — Advanced RLS Policy Patterns.
• references/social-schema.md — Social Features Schema Patterns.