#Immich is failing to start; Postgres is stuck in "the database is starting up" error loop

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sharp girder
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Immich has been running successfully on my OpenMediaVault server for several months; however, just as of this morning, I've started encountering serious issues. Navigating to my Immich instance URL gives a 502 Bad Gateway, and looking at the Docker Compose logs for immich_postgres, I see a loop of these errors:

immich_postgres  | 2026-02-25 21:22:09.058 UTC [711] FATAL:  the database system is starting up

Without a running Postgres, the immich-server service can't start properly.

I have not made any recent changes to my system or to Immich.

System Details

  • Operating System: OpenMediaVault 7.7.13-1 (Sandworm)
  • Immich version: 2.3.1
$ df -h
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
udev             16G     0   16G   0% /dev
tmpfs           3.2G  6.7M  3.2G   1% /run
/dev/nvme0n1p2  116G   66G   44G  61% /
tmpfs            16G     0   16G   0% /dev/shm
tmpfs           5.0M     0  5.0M   0% /run/lock
efivarfs        128K   15K  109K  13% /sys/firmware/efi/efivars
/dev/nvme0n1p1  511M  148K  511M   1% /boot/efi
tmpfs            16G  1.9G   14G  12% /tmp
akhet           3.6T  1.1T  2.6T  31% /akhet

Other Notes

The postgres directory specified by DB_DATA_LOCATION=${VOLUMES_PATH}/immich/postgres currently has these permissions/ownership:

drwx------ 20 openmediavault-webgui appmgr 27 Feb 25 14:24 postgres
inner lightBOT
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:wave: Hey @sharp girder,

Thanks for reaching out to us. Please carefully read this message and follow the recommended actions. This will help us be more effective in our support effort and leave more time for building Immich immich.

References

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Checklist

I have...

  1. :blue_square: verified I'm on the latest release(note that mobile app releases may take some time).
  2. :ballot_box_with_check: read applicable release notes.
  3. :ballot_box_with_check: reviewed the FAQs for known issues.
  4. :ballot_box_with_check: reviewed Github for known issues.
  5. :ballot_box_with_check: tried accessing Immich via local ip (without a custom reverse proxy).
  6. :ballot_box_with_check: uploaded the relevant information (see below).
  7. :ballot_box_with_check: tried an incognito window, disabled extensions, cleared mobile app cache, logged out and back in, different browsers, etc. as applicable

(an item can be marked as "complete" by reacting with the appropriate number)

Information

In order to be able to effectively help you, we need you to provide clear information to show what the problem is. The exact details needed vary per case, but here is a list of things to consider:

  • Your docker-compose.yml and .env files.
  • Logs from all the containers and their status (see above).
  • All the troubleshooting steps you've tried so far.
  • Any recent changes you've made to Immich or your system.
  • Details about your system (both software/OS and hardware).
  • Details about your storage (filesystems, type of disks, output of commands like fdisk -l and df -h).
  • The version of the Immich server, mobile app, and other relevant pieces.
  • Any other information that you think might be relevant.

Please paste files and logs with proper code formatting, and especially avoid blurry screenshots.
Without the right information we can't work out what the problem is. Help us help you ;)

If this ticket can be closed you can use the /close command, and re-open it later if needed.

sharp girder
sharp girder
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Environment Variables (with database connection secret omitted)

📎 Immich.env
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Regarding step 1️⃣, I am nervous about updating to the latest version while things aren't working.

inner lightBOT