pgconfigurator
pgconfigurator

autovacuum_vacuum_cost_delay

No restart — takes effect on reloadtuned by pgconfiguratortime (ms)

How long autovacuum sleeps after hitting its cost limit.

What pgconfigurator would set
32 GB · 8 vCPU · NVMe · OLTP
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What it does

The companion to the cost limit: when autovacuum has done cost-limit worth of I/O, it pauses for this many milliseconds. Shorter delays make autovacuum more aggressive; longer delays make it gentler on foreground traffic.

How to tune it

The default is 2 ms (modern versions). Lowering it toward 0 — or raising the cost limit instead — speeds autovacuum up when it falls behind. Raise it only if autovacuum I/O is visibly hurting latency on slow storage.

Related parameters