Anti-Patterns

  1. Using ST_Distance OR ST_Intersects with ST_Buffer for proximity queries
  2. Using ST_Contains/ST_Within instead of ST_Covers/ST_CoveredBy
  3. Using NOT IN or COUNT <... instead of NOT EXISTS
  4. Using ST_MakePoint or ST_PointFromText instead of ST_Point

Using ST_Distance OR ST_Intersects with ST_Buffer for proximity queries

A simple way to test if geometries are near to (within a distance of) a given geometry is to compute the buffer of the query geometry and then use ST_Intersects against the buffer geometry. However, this is somewhat inaccurate, since buffers are only approximations, and computing large buffers can be slow.

Another way is to use ST_Distance. But this forces the full distance to be computed even though it is not needed. Also, this query does not take advantage of spatial indexes.

Instead, use ST_DWithin instead, since it is automatically indexed, is faster to compute, and is more accurate. (it avoids having to compute the explicit buffer, which is only a close approximiation of the true distance).

Using ST_Contains/ST_Within instead of ST_Covers/ST_CoveredBy

ST_Contains and ST_Within have a subtle quirk in their definition. It includes the requirement that at least one Interior point must be in common. This means that “Polygons do not contain their boundary”. The result is that points and lines in the boundary of a polygon are not contained by/are not within the polygon. ST_Covers and ST_CoveredBy do not have this semantic peculiarity (and may be faster to execute as well).

Using NOT IN or COUNT <... instead of NOT EXISTS

This anti-pattern occurs when querying to find rows which are not in a given set of other rows (which may be in the same table or a different one).

Do not use NOT IN subquery, since it forces the subquery to compute the entire set of rows which do not match.

Instead, use the SQL anti-join pattern (see this blog post). This uses NOT EXISTS subquery to allow the query engine to short-circuit the subquery evaluation if a match is found.

Using ST_MakePoint or ST_PointFromText instead of ST_Point

ST_Point (and variants) is the standard function to use.
ST_MakePoint is obsolete. They are both much faster than ST_PointFromText.