Skip to content

LWLock: WALBufMapping

Waiting to replace a page in WAL buffers
PostgreSQL wait event dossier
ClassLWLock EventWALBufMapping VersionsPG 13-18 Evidence3 source location(s)

Official description

Waiting to replace a page in WAL buffers

PG 13 PG 14 PG 15 PG 16 PG 17 PG 18

Trigger mechanism

WALBufMappingLock coordinates the mapping between WAL page numbers and the finite wal_buffers slots. A backend needs it when advancing to or replacing a WAL buffer page.

Normal or trouble?

  • Normal: Short waits appear as WAL generation advances through buffer pages.
  • Investigate: Sustained contention suggests WAL generation is turning over buffers faster than the write path advances, often during write bursts or checkpoints.

Diagnostic SQL

Sessions waiting on LWLock/WALBufMapping
SELECT pid, backend_type, usename, datname, application_name,
       state, now() - query_start AS query_age,
       now() - xact_start AS xact_age,
       wait_event_type, wait_event,
       pg_blocking_pids(pid) AS blocking_pids,
       left(query, 160) AS query
FROM pg_stat_activity
WHERE wait_event_type = 'LWLock'
  AND wait_event = 'WALBufMapping'
ORDER BY query_age DESC NULLS LAST;
Current LWLock cohort
SELECT wait_event, count(*) AS waiting_sessions,
       count(*) FILTER (WHERE state = 'active') AS active_waiters,
       max(now() - query_start) AS oldest_query
FROM pg_stat_activity
WHERE wait_event_type = 'LWLock'
GROUP BY wait_event
ORDER BY waiting_sessions DESC, wait_event;
Lock and relation context for these sessions
SELECT a.pid, l.locktype, l.mode, l.granted, l.fastpath,
       d.datname, n.nspname, c.relname,
       l.page, l.tuple, l.virtualxid, l.transactionid,
       l.classid, l.objid, l.objsubid
FROM pg_stat_activity AS a
LEFT JOIN pg_locks AS l ON l.pid = a.pid
LEFT JOIN pg_database AS d ON d.oid = l.database
LEFT JOIN pg_class AS c
  ON c.oid = l.relation
 AND l.database = (
       SELECT oid FROM pg_database WHERE datname = current_database()
     )
LEFT JOIN pg_namespace AS n ON n.oid = c.relnamespace
WHERE a.wait_event_type = 'LWLock'
  AND a.wait_event = 'WALBufMapping'
ORDER BY a.pid, l.granted, l.locktype, l.mode;

Response

  1. Correlate with WAL bytes, WAL writes, and checkpoint timing.
  2. Check whether wal_buffers is repeatedly exhausted during bursts.
  3. Smooth write bursts and fix WAL device latency before tuning buffer size.

Source evidence

Typical incident pattern

A bulk load saturates WAL generation while the WAL device stalls, forcing frequent WAL buffer remapping.