Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL: PostgreSQL 16.14 end of standard support

The AWS release calendar for Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL lists Sep 2027 as the RDS end of standard support date of minor version 16.14. Minor versions can reach the end of standard support before the corresponding major versions. Dates that show only a month and a year are approximate, and AWS updates them with the exact date when it is known. For the policy on deprecating database engine versions, AWS refers to Database Engine Versions in the Amazon RDS FAQs.

1. Find the valid upgrade targets for the database. The AWS Management Console shows them when you upgrade a database. The AWS CLI command aws rds describe-db-engine-versions, run with the --engine postgres, --engine-version and --query options that the AWS page gives, also identifies them. See Finding valid upgrade targets.
2. If the database has read replicas, upgrade all of the read replicas before you upgrade the source instance or cluster.
3. Start the minor version upgrade manually by modifying the database. For a Multi-AZ DB instance deployment, the database might not be available for several minutes while the upgrade completes. See Manually upgrading the engine version.
4. The Auto minor version upgrade option can be enabled when you create or modify the database. A database with this option is upgraded automatically during its maintenance window if it runs a minor version lower than the current automatic upgrade minor version. AWS states that RDS designates an automatic upgrade version for some major versions in some AWS Regions. The AWS page gives an AWS CLI command that determines the current automatic minor upgrade target for a minor version in a Region: if no version in its output has an AutoUpgrade value of True, RDS has not designated an automatic upgrade version for that major version in that Region. RDS does not automatically set newer released minor versions as the automatic upgrade version. See Automatic minor version upgrades for RDS for PostgreSQL.
5. After an upgrade is complete, you cannot revert to the previous version of the DB engine. To return to it, restore the DB snapshot taken before the upgrade to create a new database. Amazon RDS takes that snapshot only if the backup retention period is greater than 0. A custom backup retention period cannot be configured for a Multi-AZ DB cluster.