Two peas, one pod
MCP Toolbox for Databases vs Postgres MCP Pro
By Sophie Filer · checked against both servers on 27 Oct 2026
For Postgres alone, Postgres MCP Pro gives the more useful advice: it explains plans and recommends indexes from your workload. Toolbox is the better choice when you have several kinds of database, are on Google Cloud, or want to hand the assistant a short list of approved queries instead of open SQL.
MCP Toolbox for Databases
Google's toolbox for Postgres, MySQL, BigQuery, Spanner and other databases.
Postgres MCP Pro
SQL, query plans, health checks and index advice for Postgres.
Side by side
| Compared | MCP Toolbox for Databases | Postgres MCP Pro |
|---|---|---|
| Made by | Google (googleapis) | Crystal DBA |
| Databases | Postgres, MySQL, BigQuery, Spanner, AlloyDB and more | Postgres only |
| Approved queries only | Yes, define them in tools.yaml | No; restricted mode limits SQL to reads |
| Index advice | Lists indexes, bloat and stats | Recommends new indexes, simulated with hypopg |
| Maker | Crystal DBA | |
| Runs as | An npm package or binary | A Docker container |
| Tools | 29 (22 only read) | 9 (4 only read) |
| Context its tools take | At least ~3,000 tokens | At least ~500 tokens |
| Runs on | Your computer | Your computer |
| You need | Node.js 18 or newer; Connection details for your database | Docker; A Postgres connection string |
| Our install check | Started in our test | Started in our test |
| Licence | Apache-2.0 | – |
| GitHub stars | 16.7K | 3.4K |
| Last commit | 25 Oct 2026 | 17 Aug 2026 |
Stars and commit dates refresh daily; tool counts come from our own run of each server.
Pick MCP Toolbox for Databases if
- You use more than one kind of database
- Your data is in BigQuery, Spanner or AlloyDB
- You want the assistant limited to queries you wrote
Pick Postgres MCP Pro if
- You run Postgres and want to know why it is slow
- You want a health check covering vacuum, bloat and connections
- You want open SQL, but read-only, for exploring data
Can you run both?
Running both against one Postgres gives the assistant two execute_sql tools, which invites confusion. Pick one per database, or load Toolbox with a custom tools file and no raw SQL.