LWLock: Checkpoint
Waiting to begin a checkpoint.
PostgreSQL wait event dossier
ClassLWLock
Event
Checkpoint
VersionsPG 13
Evidence3 source location(s)
Official description
Waiting to begin a checkpoint.
| PG 13 | PG 14 | PG 15 | PG 16 | PG 17 | PG 18 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ✓ | — | — | — | — | — |
Trigger mechanism
pgstat_report_wait_start at src/backend/storage/lmgr/lwlock.c:765 is the grep-verified reporting path. The public identity/resource is mapped at src/backend/access/transam/xlog.c:8957. The instrumented operation is: Waiting to begin a checkpoint. LWLockAcquire could not immediately take the lightweight-lock tranche displayed as Checkpoint. The generic LWLock reporter publishes the tranche name while the backend sleeps on the internal shared-memory resource.
Normal or trouble?
- Normal: A brief sample is normal around short internal critical sections.
- Investigate: Investigate when the same tranche affects at least 10% of active foreground sessions in three consecutive one-second samples; treat 25% or waits beyond five seconds as urgent.
Diagnostic SQL
Sessions waiting on LWLock/Checkpoint
Current LWLock cohort
Lock and relation context for these sessions
Response
- Repeat the snapshot and isolate one hot tranche.
- Correlate it with the protected resource and current workload phase.
- Reduce the specific contention source; adding concurrency can make a shared-memory hotspot worse.
Source evidence
- PostgreSQL 13.23 · src/backend/access/transam/xlog.c:8957 —
Checkpoint - PostgreSQL 13.23 · src/backend/storage/lmgr/lwlock.c:765 —
pgstat_report_wait_start - PostgreSQL 13.23 · src/backend/storage/lmgr/lwlocknames.c:14 —
Checkpoint
Related controls and signals
- GUCs: [guc:checkpoint_timeout] · [guc:max_wal_size]
- Metrics: [metric:waiting_sessions] · [metric:wait_event_share] · [metric:checkpoint_time]