Supabase

Supabase is a backend-as-a-service platform that bundles a real PostgreSQL database with auto-generated APIs, authentication, file storage, and real-time subscriptions — the same pitch as Firebase, but built on an open-source, standard SQL database instead of a proprietary document store. You get a full backend without writing one, while keeping your data in a database you could self-host or export at any time.

Supabase is a strong pick when you want Firebase-style speed — instant APIs, built-in auth, live updates — but also want real SQL: relational data, joins, and the ability to run standard Postgres tooling against your database. It's a newer project than Firebase, so its community, third-party tutorials, and Stack Overflow answers are smaller, and some advanced features are less battle-tested. For a first project with structured data and no real-time requirement, plain PostgreSQL or MySQL is simpler to reason about; for real-time needs with the largest ecosystem, Firebase is more established.

• It's just Postgres — your data lives in a standard PostgreSQL database; anything you know about SQL applies directly.
• Auto-generated APIs — create a table and Supabase instantly exposes a REST and GraphQL-like API for it, no backend code required.
• Row-level security (RLS) — instead of writing server-side authorization checks, you write Postgres policies that decide which rows a given user is allowed to read or write.
• Real-time subscriptions — the client can subscribe to changes on a table and receive live updates, similar to Firestore's real-time listeners.
• Built-in auth and storage — email/password and social login, plus file storage, ship as part of the platform alongside the database.

import { createClient } from "@supabase/supabase-js";
const supabase = createClient(SUPABASE_URL, SUPABASE_ANON_KEY);

const { data, error } = await supabase
  .from("posts")
  .select("*")
  .eq("published", true);

No backend route to write — the client library talks to the auto-generated API directly, with row-level security policies deciding what data actually comes back.

1. Create a free project at supabase.com — this provisions a real Postgres database for you.
2. Create a table in the dashboard's table editor and note how an API for it appears immediately under the API docs tab.
3. In a React or plain JS project, install the client with npm install @supabase/supabase-js and run your first select() query.
4. Enable row-level security on your table and write a policy so users can only see their own rows — this is the piece most worth understanding well before shipping anything real.
5. Subscribe to a table's changes with supabase.channel() to see real-time updates working end to end.