---
title: Index Creation
description: Settings to make index creation faster
canonical: https://docs.paradedb.com/documentation/performance-tuning/create-index
---

These actions can improve the performance and memory consumption of `CREATE INDEX` and `REINDEX` statements.

### Raise Parallel Indexing Workers

ParadeDB uses Postgres' `max_parallel_maintenance_workers` setting to determine the degree of parallelism during `CREATE INDEX`/`REINDEX`. Postgres' default is `2`, which may be too low for large tables.

```sql
SET max_parallel_maintenance_workers = 8;
```

In order for `max_parallel_maintenance_workers` to take effect, it must be less than or equal to both `max_parallel_workers` and `max_worker_processes`.

A good rule of thumb for `max_parallel_maintenance_workers` is `CPUs / 2 (minimum 2, maximum 8)`.

### Configure Indexing Memory

The default Postgres `maintenance_work_mem` value of `64MB` is quite conservative and can slow down parallel index builds. A good starting value is `RAM / 16` and at least `64MB` per
[parallel indexing worker](#raise-parallel-indexing-workers).

```sql
SET maintenance_work_mem = '2GB';
```

<Note>
  Each worker is required to have at least `15MB` memory. If
  `maintenance_work_mem` is set too low, an error will be returned.
</Note>

### Defer Index Creation

If possible, creating the BM25 index should be deferred until **after** a table has been populated. To illustrate:

```sql
-- This is preferred
CREATE TABLE test (id SERIAL, data text);
INSERT INTO test (data) VALUES ('hello world'), ('many more values');
CREATE INDEX ON test USING bm25 (id, data) WITH (key_field = 'id');

-- ...to this
CREATE TABLE test (id SERIAL, data text);
CREATE INDEX ON test USING bm25 (id, data) WITH (key_field = 'id');
INSERT INTO test (data) VALUES ('hello world'), ('many more values');
```

This allows the BM25 index to create a more tightly packed, efficient representation on disk and will lead to faster build times.
