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START TRANSACTION(7)               PostgreSQL 14.23 Documentation               START TRANSACTION(7)



NAME
       START_TRANSACTION - start a transaction block

SYNOPSIS
       START TRANSACTION [ transaction_mode [, ...] ]

       where transaction_mode is one of:

           ISOLATION LEVEL { SERIALIZABLE | REPEATABLE READ | READ COMMITTED | READ UNCOMMITTED }
           READ WRITE | READ ONLY
           [ NOT ] DEFERRABLE

DESCRIPTION
       This command begins a new transaction block. If the isolation level, read/write mode, or
       deferrable mode is specified, the new transaction has those characteristics, as if SET
       TRANSACTION was executed. This is the same as the BEGIN command.

PARAMETERS
       Refer to SET TRANSACTION (SET_TRANSACTION(7)) for information on the meaning of the
       parameters to this statement.

COMPATIBILITY
       In the standard, it is not necessary to issue START TRANSACTION to start a transaction block:
       any SQL command implicitly begins a block.  PostgreSQL's behavior can be seen as implicitly
       issuing a COMMIT after each command that does not follow START TRANSACTION (or BEGIN), and it
       is therefore often called “autocommit”. Other relational database systems might offer an
       autocommit feature as a convenience.

       The DEFERRABLE transaction_mode is a PostgreSQL language extension.

       The SQL standard requires commas between successive transaction_modes, but for historical
       reasons PostgreSQL allows the commas to be omitted.

       See also the compatibility section of SET TRANSACTION (SET_TRANSACTION(7)).

SEE ALSO
       BEGIN(7), COMMIT(7), ROLLBACK(7), SAVEPOINT(7), SET TRANSACTION (SET_TRANSACTION(7))



PostgreSQL 14.23                                2026                            START TRANSACTION(7)