--- title: "PostGIS Performance: Intersection Predicates..." url: https://daily.dev/posts/postgis-performance-intersection-predicates--qvmouzxcq source_url: https://www.crunchydata.com/blog/postgis-performance-intersection-predicates-and-overlays type: article source: "Crunchy Data" published: 2025-11-14T18:11:45.662Z updated: 2025-11-14T18:12:06.377Z tags: ["performance", "sql", "postgresql"] reading_time: 4 upvotes: 0 comments: 0 language: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # PostGIS Performance: Intersection Predicates... **[Crunchy Data](https://daily.dev/sources/crunchydata)** · 4 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary Boolean spatial predicates like ST_Intersects and ST_Contains are significantly faster than spatial overlay operations like ST_Intersection. When clipping geometries within a boundary, you can optimize performance by using a CASE statement to separate fully contained features (which don't need clipping) from boundary-crossing features (which do). This approach uses fast predicates to filter geometries into two streams, applying the expensive ST_Intersection only when necessary, resulting in measurable performance improvements even on small datasets. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [PostGIS Performance: Simplification](https://daily.dev/posts/postgis-performance-simplification-uzmdnf7sb) · Crunchy Data · 2 upvotes · 0 comments - [PostGIS Performance: Indexing and EXPLAIN](https://daily.dev/posts/postgis-performance-indexing-and-explain-fmb4tskgj) · Crunchy Data · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [PostGIS Performance: Improve Bounding Boxes...](https://daily.dev/posts/postgis-performance-improve-bounding-boxes--zcjfqb3vi) · Crunchy Data · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [How we made geo joins 400× faster with H3 indexes](https://daily.dev/posts/how-we-made-geo-joins-400-faster-with-h3-indexes-fcnhpwlqs) · Hacker News · 99 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#performance](https://daily.dev/tags/performance), [#sql](https://daily.dev/tags/sql), [#postgresql](https://daily.dev/tags/postgresql) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/postgis-performance-intersection-predicates--qvmouzxcq)