Branches

A branch is a full copy of the database at the moment it is created, with its own connection string and its own compute. Changes in one branch never touch another. Branches are copy-on-write, so a new branch is ready in seconds whatever the size of the data.

• Production uses the primary branch. Every other branch is created from it (or from another environment you choose).
• When the database is created, every environment the project has gets a branch. Add a branch for an environment created later with the call below.

ListCopy Anchor Link

{
  "success": true,
  "data": [
    { "environmentId": "e1d4a0f2-6c11-4a9e-8a0e-5f2b7d1c9a33", "environmentName": "production", "name": "production", "isPrimary": true, "status": "ready", "createdAt": "2026-10-16T08:00:00.000Z" },
    { "environmentId": "7c2f9e10-1d4b-4a8e-b6a1-0e9d3c5f2a71", "environmentName": "staging", "name": "staging", "isPrimary": false, "status": "ready", "createdAt": "2026-10-16T09:12:00.000Z" }
  ]
}

CreateCopy Anchor Link

curl -X POST https://api.helipod.io/api/databases/$DB/branches \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer hel_your_key" -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d "{ \"environmentId\": \"$STAGING\" }"

If the environment already has a branch, it is returned unchanged. To start staging again from fresh production data, delete its branch and create it again.

DeleteCopy Anchor Link

The primary branch can't be deleted, because every other branch is created from it. Delete the whole database instead.

Typical flowCopy Anchor Link

1. Create a staging environment in the project.
2. POST /branches with its id: staging now has a copy of production.
3. Read /connection?environmentId= for staging and set it as DATABASE_URL on the staging service.
4. Test migrations on staging with SQL (environmentId = staging) before running them on production.