Load PocketBase data to DuckDB

PocketBase is an open-source backend consisting of an embedded SQLite database with real-time subscriptions, built-in authentication management, and a simple REST-ish API. Everything needed to build a working PocketBase → DuckDB pipeline is on this page: the API's base URL, authentication, endpoints, pagination and incremental field — plus a prompt that hands the whole job to your coding agent.

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Build your PocketBase to DuckDB pipeline

Paste this prompt into Claude, Codex, or Cursor. The agent does the rest.

PromptCopy prompt
Run uvx dlthub-init@latest to build a pipeline from PocketBase to DuckDB and run it on dltHub

That scaffolds a dltHub workspace and installs the dltHub AI harness — the project rules, the secrets-management skill, and the dlt MCP server your agent needs to work safely. From there it reads the PocketBase API, proposes the endpoints to load, then writes, runs and validates the pipeline while you review rather than type. Credentials are inspected through MCP tools, so your agent never reads secrets.toml itself. How the LLM-native workflow works →

Prefer to write it yourself? Every fact the agent uses is below.

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PocketBase API at a glance

These values come from the PocketBase API reference — the authoritative source if anything here looks out of date.

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How do I authenticate with the PocketBase API?

PocketBase uses token-based authentication via the Authorization header; the header value is the raw token, although a Bearer prefix is optionally accepted for client compatibility.

1. Get your credentials

PocketBase does not use traditional static API keys. Instead, it relies on JWT-based authentication tokens. For administrative access, authenticate by sending a POST request to /api/admins/auth-with-password with your administrator email and password. For other entities, use the appropriate /api/collections/{collection}/auth-with-password or similar authentication endpoint. You can also generate long-lived, non-renewable tokens for server-to-server communication by using the Superuser Impersonate feature found in the PocketBase Admin Dashboard under the _superusers collection or via the Impersonate API.

2. Add them to .dlt/secrets.toml

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[sources.pocketbase_source]
# Note: PocketBase uses Bearer tokens, not static API keys.
# Use an admin email/password to retrieve a token via POST /api/admins/auth-with-password
# or generate a long-lived token via the Admin Dashboard.
pb_admin_email = "admin@example.com"
pb_admin_password = "your_secure_password"
pb_auth_token = "your_generated_jwt_token_here"

dlt reads this file automatically at runtime. With the harness, the setup-secrets skill prompts you for the values and never handles the raw credential in chat. For production, see setting up credentials with dlt.

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What PocketBase data can I load into DuckDB?

These are the PocketBase endpoints dlt can load into DuckDB:

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How do I load only new PocketBase records?

PocketBase exposes created on api/collections/{collectionIdOrName}/records, so dlt can request only the records that changed since the last run. Set it as the cursor_path and dlt tracks the high-water mark for you between runs.

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{"name": "records", "endpoint": {
    "path": "api/collections/{collectionIdOrName}/records",
    "data_selector": "items",
    "incremental": {"cursor_path": "created", "initial_value": "2024-01-01T00:00:00Z"},
}}

On the first run dlt loads everything from initial_value; on every run after that it requests only what changed and appends with write_disposition="merge" if you set a primary key. See incremental loading.

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What does the generated PocketBase pipeline look like?

A standard dlt REST API pipeline — the same code you would write by hand, loading /api/admins/auth-with-password and /api/collections/{collection}/auth-with-password from the PocketBase API into DuckDB:

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import dlt
from dlt.sources.rest_api import RESTAPIConfig, rest_api_resources

@dlt.source
def pocketbase_source(auth_token=dlt.secrets.value):
    config: RESTAPIConfig = {
        "client": {
            "base_url": "http://127.0.0.1:8090/api/",
            "auth": {"type": "bearer", "token": auth_token},
        },
        "resources": [
            {"name": "records", "endpoint": {"path": "api/collections/{collectionIdOrName}/records", "data_selector": "items"}},
            {"name": "collections", "endpoint": {"path": "api/collections"}}
        ],
    }
    yield from rest_api_resources(config)


def load_pocketbase_to_duckdb() -> None:
    pipeline = dlt.pipeline(
        pipeline_name="pocketbase_pipeline",
        destination="duckdb",
        dataset_name="pocketbase_data",
    )
    load_info = pipeline.run(pocketbase_source())
    print(load_info)


if __name__ == "__main__":
    load_pocketbase_to_duckdb()

Run it with python pocketbase_pipeline.py. The agent iterates on this until it loads cleanly — you review and approve, rather than write it from scratch.

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How do I query PocketBase data in DuckDB?

dlt creates one table per resource. Query the loaded data with Python or SQL — or ask your agent to, through the MCP server's execute_sql_query tool.

Python (pandas DataFrame):

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import dlt

data = dlt.pipeline("pocketbase_pipeline").dataset()
df = data.records.df()
print(df.head())

SQL:

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SELECT * FROM pocketbase_data.records LIMIT 10;

See querying your data with dataset and exploring it in marimo notebooks.

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How do I deploy the PocketBase to DuckDB pipeline in production?

The pipeline runs locally, which is ideal for prototyping and one-off analysis. When you need it on a schedule, monitored on every load, and shared with your team, deploy the same dlt code on the dltHub platform — no infrastructure to maintain. The prompt above already ends with "run it on dltHub", so your agent can take it there directly.

• Deploy & schedule — run the pipeline as a managed job with automatic retries.
• Monitor — observable job queues, alerting, and load metrics for every run.
• Transform — promote raw PocketBase loads into governed, documented models.
• Visualize & share — explore data in notebooks and publish live dashboards instead of static screenshots.

Book a demo →

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What other destinations can I load PocketBase data to?

dlt loads into any of these — only the destination argument changes:

Set dlt.pipeline(destination="snowflake") and add credentials in .dlt/secrets.toml. On the dltHub platform the same pipeline runs against a managed Iceberg lakehouse. See the full destinations list.

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Next steps

• Ready for production? Book a demo of the dltHub platform →
• dlt LLM-native workflow docs
• REST API source reference
• Join the dlt community on Slack