bug: Error: Required database environment variables are not set. Provide a postgres url for DATABASE_URL.

[yurik687]

Describe the bug

Web and Worker Fails with Error: Required database environment variables are not set. Provide a postgres url for DATABASE_URL.

To reproduce

Values:
postgresql:
deploy: false
directUrl: "postgresql://langfuse:cocococ@pastgres.patroni-dev.svc.cluster.local:5432/langfuse?schema=public"
auth:
password: "cococo"

Chart version and values.yaml configuration

No response

Kubernetes Status

No response

Logs

No response

Additional information

No response

Are you interested to contribute a fix for this bug?

No

[dosubot]

Hi @yurik687! I'm Dosu and I’m helping the langfuse-k8s team.

The error happens because the Helm chart does not automatically set the DATABASE_URL environment variable from postgresql.directUrl when using an external Postgres (postgresql.deploy: false). The application requires DATABASE_URL to be explicitly set in the pod environment—otherwise, web and worker pods can't connect to the database and fail to start.

To fix this, add the full Postgres connection string as DATABASE_URL under langfuse.additionalEnv in your values.yaml. For example:

langfuse:
  additionalEnv:
    - name: DATABASE_URL
      value: "postgresql://langfuse:cocococ@pastgres.patroni-dev.svc.cluster.local:5432/langfuse?schema=public"

postgresql:
  deploy: false
  # You can remove auth fields if DATABASE_URL is set via additionalEnv

For better security, you can store the connection string in a Kubernetes secret and reference it:

langfuse:
  additionalEnv:
    - name: DATABASE_URL
      valueFrom:
        secretKeyRef:
          name: my-db-secret
          key: database_url

postgresql:
  deploy: false

And create the secret:

apiVersion: v1
kind: Secret
metadata:
  name: my-db-secret
  namespace: <your-namespace>
type: Opaque
stringData:
  database_url: "postgresql://langfuse:cocococ@pastgres.patroni-dev.svc.cluster.local:5432/langfuse?schema=public"

This approach ensures DATABASE_URL is injected into your pods and resolves the startup error. You can remove individual auth fields if you use this method. More details and examples are in the docs and related issues.

To reply, just mention @dosu.

---

^{How did I do? Good | Irrelevant | Incorrect | Verbose | Hallucination | Report 🐛 | Other}

   

[Steffen911]

Also, please check the example that we provide on using an external postgres server: https://github.com/langfuse/langfuse-k8s?tab=readme-ov-file#with-an-external-postgres-server.