railway-database

name	railway-database
description	Add official Railway database services (Postgres, Redis, MySQL, MongoDB). Use when user wants to add a database, says "add postgres", "add redis", "add database", "connect to database", or "wire up the database". For other templates (Ghost, Strapi, n8n), use the railway-templates skill.
version	1.0.0
author	Railway
license	MIT
tags	["Railway","Database","Postgres","Redis","MySQL","MongoDB","Infrastructure","Deployment","Template"]
dependencies	["railway-cli"]
allowed-tools	Bash(railway:*)

Railway Database

Add official Railway database services. These are maintained templates with pre-configured volumes, networking, and connection variables.

For non-database templates, see the railway-templates skill.

When to Use

• User asks to "add a database", "add Postgres", "add Redis", etc.
• User needs a database for their application
• User asks about connecting to a database
• User says "add postgres and connect to my server"
• User says "wire up the database"

Decision Flow

ALWAYS check for existing databases FIRST before creating.

User mentions database
        │
  Check existing DBs first
  (query env config for source.image)
        │
   ┌────┴────┐
 Exists    Doesn't exist
    │           │
    │      Create database
    │      (CLI or API)
    │           │
    │      Wait for deployment
    │           │
    └─────┬─────┘
          │
    User wants to
    connect service?
          │
    ┌─────┴─────┐
   Yes         No
    │           │
Wire vars    Done +
via env     suggest wiring
skill

Check for Existing Databases

Before creating a database, check if one already exists.

For full environment config structure, see environment-config.md.

railway status --json

Then query environment config and check source.image for each service:

query environmentConfig($environmentId: String!) {
  environment(id: $environmentId) {
    config(decryptVariables: false)
  }
}

The config.services object contains each service's configuration. Check source.image for:

• ghcr.io/railway/postgres* or → Postgres