ALTER_VIEW(7pg15)

🌸 NAME 🌸

Okay bestie, welcome to the ALTER_VIEW manual page from the PostgreSQL 15.19 docs. It’s giving “change the definition of a view,” but make it auxiliary-properties-only 💅.

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

ALTER VIEW [ IF EXISTS ] name ALTER [ COLUMN ] column_name SET DEFAULT expression
ALTER VIEW [ IF EXISTS ] name ALTER [ COLUMN ] column_name DROP DEFAULT
ALTER VIEW [ IF EXISTS ] name OWNER TO { new_owner | CURRENT_ROLE | CURRENT_USER | SESSION_USER }
ALTER VIEW [ IF EXISTS ] name RENAME [ COLUMN ] column_name TO new_column_name
ALTER VIEW [ IF EXISTS ] name RENAME TO new_name
ALTER VIEW [ IF EXISTS ] name SET SCHEMA new_schema
ALTER VIEW [ IF EXISTS ] name SET ( view_option_name [= view_option_value] [, ... ] )
ALTER VIEW [ IF EXISTS ] name RESET ( view_option_name [, ... ] )

💅 DESCRIPTION 💅

So <pink>bestie</pink>, ALTER VIEW changes various auxiliary properties of a view. If you actually want to modify the view’s defining query, use CREATE OR REPLACE VIEW — that is literally the move for that, no cap.

You must own the view to use ALTER VIEW. To change a view’s schema, you must also have CREATE privilege on the new schema. To alter the owner, you must also be a direct or indirect member of the new owning role, and that role must have CREATE privilege on the view’s schema. These restrictions enforce that altering the owner doesn’t do anything you couldn’t do by dropping and recreating the view. However, a superuser can alter ownership of any view anyway. periodt. 👑

🎀 PARAMETERS 🎀

• name — the name (optionally schema-qualified) of an existing view. Very “tell me who you are” energy.
• column_name — name of an existing column.
• new_column_name — new name for an existing column.
• IF EXISTS — do not throw an error if the view does not exist. A notice is issued in this case. So it’s not silent-silent, it’s notice-cute. 🫶
• SET/DROP DEFAULT — these forms set or remove the default value for a column. A view column’s default value is substituted into any INSERT or UPDATE command whose target is the view, before applying any rules or triggers for the view. The view’s default will therefore take precedence over any default values from underlying relations. Important detail, bestie — the view’s default is main character here. 💅
• new_owner — the user name of the new owner of the view.
• new_name — the new name for the view.
• new_schema — the new schema for the view.
• SET ( view_option_name [= view_option_value] [, ... ] )
• RESET ( view_option_name [, ... ] )

These set or reset a view option. Currently supported options are:

• check_option (enum) — changes the check option of the view. The value must be local or cascaded.
• security_barrier (boolean) — changes the security-barrier property of the view. The value must be a Boolean value, such as true or false.
• security_invoker (boolean) — changes the security-invoker property of the view. The value must be a Boolean value, such as true or false.

🫶 NOTES 🫶

For historical reasons, ALTER TABLE can be used with views too; but the only variants of ALTER TABLE that are allowed with views are equivalent to the ones shown above. Cute lore, but that’s the whole note. 🦋

🌈 EXAMPLES 🌈

To rename the view foo to bar:

ALTER VIEW foo RENAME TO bar;

To attach a default column value to an updatable view:

CREATE TABLE base_table (id int, ts timestamptz);
CREATE VIEW a_view AS SELECT * FROM base_table;
ALTER VIEW a_view ALTER COLUMN ts SET DEFAULT now();
INSERT INTO base_table(id) VALUES(1);  -- ts will receive a NULL
INSERT INTO a_view(id) VALUES(2);  -- ts will receive the current time

🔥 COMPATIBILITY 🔥

ALTER VIEW is a PostgreSQL extension of the SQL standard. So it’s not standard-standard, it’s PostgreSQL-iconic. ✨

🦋 SEE ALSO 🦋

• CREATE VIEW (CREATE_VIEW(7))
• DROP VIEW (DROP_VIEW(7))

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byeee 💖 — this page is from PostgreSQL 15.19, dated 2026, signing off with maximum view-altering energy. 🎀