REVOKE — remove access privileges
REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { { SELECT | INSERT | UPDATE | DELETE | TRUNCATE | REFERENCES | TRIGGER | MAINTAIN } [, ...] | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON { [ TABLE ]table_name
[, ...] | ALL TABLES IN SCHEMAschema_name
[, ...] } FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { { SELECT | INSERT | UPDATE | REFERENCES } (column_name
[, ...] ) [, ...] | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] (column_name
[, ...] ) } ON [ TABLE ]table_name
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { { USAGE | SELECT | UPDATE } [, ...] | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON { SEQUENCEsequence_name
[, ...] | ALL SEQUENCES IN SCHEMAschema_name
[, ...] } FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { { CREATE | CONNECT | TEMPORARY | TEMP } [, ...] | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON DATABASEdatabase_name
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { USAGE | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON DOMAINdomain_name
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { USAGE | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON FOREIGN DATA WRAPPERfdw_name
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { USAGE | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON FOREIGN SERVERserver_name
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { EXECUTE | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON { { FUNCTION | PROCEDURE | ROUTINE }function_name
[ ( [ [argmode
] [arg_name
]arg_type
[, ...] ] ) ] [, ...] | ALL { FUNCTIONS | PROCEDURES | ROUTINES } IN SCHEMAschema_name
[, ...] } FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { USAGE | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON LANGUAGElang_name
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { { SELECT | UPDATE } [, ...] | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON LARGE OBJECTloid
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { { SET | ALTER SYSTEM } [, ...] | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON PARAMETERconfiguration_parameter
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { { CREATE | USAGE } [, ...] | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON PUBLICATIONpublication_name
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { { CREATE | USAGE } [, ...] | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON SCHEMAschema_name
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { CREATE | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON TABLESPACEtablespace_name
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ GRANT OPTION FOR ] { USAGE | ALL [ PRIVILEGES ] } ON TYPEtype_name
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] REVOKE [ { ADMIN | INHERIT | SET } OPTION FOR ]role_name
[, ...] FROMrole_specification
[, ...] [ GRANTED BYrole_specification
] [ CASCADE | RESTRICT ] whererole_specification
can be: [ GROUP ]role_name
| PUBLIC | CURRENT_ROLE | CURRENT_USER | SESSION_USER
The REVOKE
command revokes previously granted
privileges from one or more roles. The key word
PUBLIC
refers to the implicitly defined group of
all roles.
See the description of the GRANT
command for
the meaning of the privilege types.
Note that any particular role will have the sum
of privileges granted directly to it, privileges granted to any role it
is presently a member of, and privileges granted to
PUBLIC
. Thus, for example, revoking SELECT
privilege
from PUBLIC
does not necessarily mean that all roles
have lost SELECT
privilege on the object: those who have it granted
directly or via another role will still have it. Similarly, revoking
SELECT
from a user might not prevent that user from using
SELECT
if PUBLIC
or another membership
role still has SELECT
rights.
If GRANT OPTION FOR
is specified, only the grant
option for the privilege is revoked, not the privilege itself.
Otherwise, both the privilege and the grant option are revoked.
If a user holds a privilege with grant option and has granted it to
other users then the privileges held by those other users are
called dependent privileges. If the privilege or the grant option
held by the first user is being revoked and dependent privileges
exist, those dependent privileges are also revoked if
CASCADE
is specified; if it is not, the revoke action
will fail. This recursive revocation only affects privileges that
were granted through a chain of users that is traceable to the user
that is the subject of this REVOKE
command.
Thus, the affected users might effectively keep the privilege if it
was also granted through other users.
When revoking privileges on a table, the corresponding column privileges (if any) are automatically revoked on each column of the table, as well. On the other hand, if a role has been granted privileges on a table, then revoking the same privileges from individual columns will have no effect.
When revoking membership in a role, GRANT OPTION
is instead
called ADMIN OPTION
, but the behavior is similar.
Note that, in releases prior to PostgreSQL 16,
dependent privileges were not tracked for grants of role membership,
and thus CASCADE
had no effect for role membership.
This is no longer the case.
Note also that this form of the command does not
allow the noise word GROUP
in role_specification
.
Just as ADMIN OPTION
can be removed from an existing
role grant, it is also possible to revoke INHERIT OPTION
or SET OPTION
. This is equivalent to setting the value
of the corresponding option to FALSE
.
A user can only revoke privileges that were granted directly by
that user. If, for example, user A has granted a privilege with
grant option to user B, and user B has in turn granted it to user
C, then user A cannot revoke the privilege directly from C.
Instead, user A could revoke the grant option from user B and use
the CASCADE
option so that the privilege is
in turn revoked from user C. For another example, if both A and B
have granted the same privilege to C, A can revoke their own grant
but not B's grant, so C will still effectively have the privilege.
When a non-owner of an object attempts to REVOKE
privileges
on the object, the command will fail outright if the user has no
privileges whatsoever on the object. As long as some privilege is
available, the command will proceed, but it will revoke only those
privileges for which the user has grant options. The REVOKE ALL
PRIVILEGES
forms will issue a warning message if no grant options are
held, while the other forms will issue a warning if grant options for
any of the privileges specifically named in the command are not held.
(In principle these statements apply to the object owner as well, but
since the owner is always treated as holding all grant options, the
cases can never occur.)
If a superuser chooses to issue a GRANT
or REVOKE
command, the command is performed as though it were issued by the
owner of the affected object. (Since roles do not have owners, in the
case of a GRANT
of role membership, the command is
performed as though it were issued by the bootstrap superuser.)
Since all privileges ultimately come
from the object owner (possibly indirectly via chains of grant options),
it is possible for a superuser to revoke all privileges, but this might
require use of CASCADE
as stated above.
REVOKE
can also be done by a role
that is not the owner of the affected object, but is a member of the role
that owns the object, or is a member of a role that holds privileges
WITH GRANT OPTION
on the object. In this case the
command is performed as though it were issued by the containing role that
actually owns the object or holds the privileges
WITH GRANT OPTION
. For example, if table
t1
is owned by role g1
, of which role
u1
is a member, then u1
can revoke privileges
on t1
that are recorded as being granted by g1
.
This would include grants made by u1
as well as by other
members of role g1
.
If the role executing REVOKE
holds privileges
indirectly via more than one role membership path, it is unspecified
which containing role will be used to perform the command. In such cases
it is best practice to use SET ROLE
to become the specific
role you want to do the REVOKE
as. Failure to do so might
lead to revoking privileges other than the ones you intended, or not
revoking anything at all.
See Section 5.8 for more information about specific privilege types, as well as how to inspect objects' privileges.
Revoke insert privilege for the public on table
films
:
REVOKE INSERT ON films FROM PUBLIC;
Revoke all privileges from user manuel
on view
kinds
:
REVOKE ALL PRIVILEGES ON kinds FROM manuel;
Note that this actually means “revoke all privileges that I granted”.
Revoke membership in role admins
from user joe
:
REVOKE admins FROM joe;
The compatibility notes of the GRANT
command
apply analogously to REVOKE
.
The keyword RESTRICT
or CASCADE
is required according to the standard, but PostgreSQL
assumes RESTRICT
by default.