Getting “[archiver] unsupported version (1.13) in file header” when running pg_restore

Question

I just upgraded to postgres 10.2 on mac os which matches 10.2 on heroku. I'm trying to download a copy of the database and restore it locally. Before the upgrade the restore would work fine.

I run

pg_restore --verbose --clean --no-acl --no-owner -h localhost -d database_name backup.dump

but I am getting this error:

pg_restore: [archiver] unsupported version (1.13) in file header

The database appears to be working OK. It's a rails app and I upgraded the pg gems. I can run rake db:create and db:migrate just fine.

Answer 1

You need to upgrade your local postgres to get the last security patch from the 2018-03-01, like Heroku did the 1st march. You need one of the last releases 10.3, 9.6.8, 9.5.12, 9.4.17, and 9.3.22.

The security patch can be found here https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/1834/.

It seems the patch modified pg_dump, that's probably why we can't use pg_restore anymore without that patch for the dump of Heroku (with the patch applied).

Answer 2

I ran into this same issue today, I don't know if something changed on Heroku's side, because locally I'm running 9.6 but my database on Heroku is 9.4, so it didn't seem to be about the version point difference (it was working until today.)

If you're using the Postgres.app (https://postgresapp.com/) on a Mac make sure you're running v2.1.3 (as of this writing that is the newest version). When you upgrade the Postgres.app you get the newest patch release of Postgres, (which is likely causing the mismatch you're currently experiencing - Heroku has upgraded for the latest security patch, and your local machine may not have it).

I had to upgrade Postgres.app from 2.1.0 to 2.1.3 and it solved the problem.

Answer 3

First time I've had this issue, here's how I restored the Heroku Database to my Local:

$ rails db:drop
$ heroku pg:pull DATABASE_URL <insert local DB name> --app <app-name>

Answer 4

Since yesterday (03/01/2018) we also had problems restoring a backup from Heroku running on PostgreSQL 9.5:

pg_restore: [archiver] unsupported version (1.13) in file header

Upgrading our PostgreSQL version from 9.5.11 to 9.5.12 fixed the issue.

Answer 5

For those who are trying to upgrade postgresql in Ubuntu without success (like Johan's commented above), try using the PostgreSQL apt repository, as stated in the official PostgreSQL download instructions: https://www.postgresql.org/download/linux/ubuntu/

deb http://apt.postgresql.org/pub/repos/apt/ xenial-pgdg main
wget --quiet -O - https://www.postgresql.org/media/keys/ACCC4CF8.asc | sudo apt-key add -
sudo apt-get update

Answer 6

The fix for me involved both updating my Postgres.app and updating my local homebrew PostgreSQL.

Update my Postgres.app via Canuk's answer:

Open Postgres.app > Check for updates...

Update my local homebrew PostgreSQL via gerry3's comment on the accepted answer:

brew upgrade postgresql brew postgresql-upgrade-database

Answer 7

Had this problem on Windows using pgAdmin 3.

Upgrading from pgAdmin 3 to pgAdmin 4 solved the problem for me.

If you are using a third-party tool, such as PgAdmin, to restore the provided dump file, the restore may not succeed even with the installed Postgres version being up to date. This is due to third-party tools often bundling their own versions of the pg_restore binary, that may not be up to date. https://help.heroku.com/YNH1ZJUS/why-am-i-getting-pg_restore-archiver-unsupported-version-1-13-in-file-header-error-with-pg_restore

Answer 8

I don't recommend upgrading your DB to a new major version locally (do apply security patches) just to fix this as you want that to match whatever version you have in production.

This fixed it on Ubuntu 16.04, restoring from a Heroku database.

First, ensure you have the postgresql repo as diego mentioned. Then install the upgraded client.

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install postgresql-client-10

If you are Ubuntu 17.04 or 17.10, note that the PostgreSQL's zesty repo does not have the updated client's you need. You will want to use the xenial Postgres repo instead.

Answer 9

Here is how I resolved the issue on Ubuntu(16.04 LTS) where pg_restore/pg_dump gave me an older version, from psql

$ pg_restore --version
pg_restore (PostgreSQL) 9.4.8

$ psql --version
psql (PostgreSQL) 9.5.14

The issue is that I have multiple pg versions installed, and pg_restore was pointing to the earlier version

$ pg_lsclusters
Ver Cluster Port Status Owner    Data directory               Log file
9.4 main    5432 online postgres /var/lib/postgresql/9.4/main /var/log/postgresql/postgresql-9.4-main.log
9.5 main    5433 online postgres /var/lib/postgresql/9.5/main /var/log/postgresql/postgresql-9.5-main.log

The fix is to create a ~/.postgresqlrc file pointing to the correct version

$ cat ~/.postgresqlrc

9.5 main *

Once this was done, pg_restore points to the correct version, and the command goes through

Details given here: https://serverfault.com/questions/610777/wrong-version-of-pg-dump-on-ubuntu

Answer 10

I encountered this problem on pgadmin III and was able to fix it through switching the binaries location:

File menu > Options > Binary Paths, then changed "PG bin path" to postgresql/9.x/bin instead of ProgramFiles/pgadmin. Restore worked fine afterwards.

Answer 11

You're using an old version of pg_restore binary that doesn't support restoring the provided dump file. Please make sure that you use the latest Postgres version, which must be higher than the following release: https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/1834/ (10.3, 9.6.8, 9.5.12, 9.4.17, and 9.3.22).

You can check the pg_restore version you're using by running pg_restore --version.

If you are using a third-party tool, such as PgAdmin, to restore the provided dump file, the restore may not succeed even with the installed Postgres version being up to date. This is due to third-party tools often bundling their own versions of the pg_restore binary, that may not be up to date.

Answer 12

I was encountering the same error. I updated to postgresql 10.3 locally, and that fixed the problem for me.

Answer 13

For Windows:

Open Command Prompt (cmd), then go to location C:\Program Files\PostgreSQL\9.6\bin and run these commands:

pg_restore -U username -d dbname -1 filename.dump
pg_restore -U postgres -d app -1 G:\app09-07-2019.backup

Hope it will help you

Answer 14

I ran in the same issue 10 minutes ago, and found out about this thread from 2005: https://www.postgresql.org/message-id/1106163722.780395.266900%40z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com

Basically the guy is saying the dump file is corrupt.