now() default values are all showing same timestamp

Question

I have created my tables with a column (type: timestamp with timezone) and set its default value to now() (current_timestamp()).

I run a series of inserts in separate statements in a single function and I noticed all the timestamps are equal down to the (ms), is the function value somehow cached and shared for the entire function call or transaction?

Answer 1

That is expected and documented behaviour:

From the manual:

Since these functions return the start time of the current transaction, their values do not change during the transaction. This is considered a feature: the intent is to allow a single transaction to have a consistent notion of the "current" time, so that multiple modifications within the same transaction bear the same time stamp.

If you want something that changes each time you run a statement, you need to use statement_timestamp() or even clock_timestamp() (again see the description in the manual)

Answer 2

now() and current_timestamp are STABLE functions returning the point in time when the transaction started as timestamptz.

Consider one of the other options PostgreSQL offers, in particular statement_timestamp(). The manual:

statement_timestamp() returns the start time of the current statement (more specifically, the time of receipt of the latest command message from the client)