# Source: https://electric-sql.com/docs/llms/_intro_redux.md

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url: /docs/llms/_intro_redux.md
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## Real-time sync for Postgres

Electric is a read-path sync engine for Postgres that does partial replication.

Electric syncs data out of Postgres into local client applications. It implements partial replication using a primitive called a Shape that is a bit like a live query for syncing.

### Key differentiators to other sync engines

* syncs out of Postgres into local client applications (i.e.: it syncs over the public Internet into many clients, as opposed to just doing sync in the cloud or between database systems)
* implements partial replication, so apps can defined Shapes to sync just the data they need
* works with any Postgres (with logical replication enabled)
  * includes working well with common Postgres hosts like Supabase, Neon, etc.
* works with any data model, including extensions
* agnostic to the choice of
  * client -- works with any language/system that speaks HTTP and JSON
  * store -- sync into anything from an in-memory state variable to a local embedded database
  * writes -- Electric just does the read-path syncing, i.e.: syncing out of Postgres, into local apps; apps built on Electric can implement writes and write-path sync themselves using their existing API
* scales to millions of concurrent users with low, flat latency and memory use
* handles high data-throughput (more than Postgres can handle)

### Primary use cases

* syncing data from Postgres in the cloud into local web and mobile applications
* building fast, modern, collaborative software like Figma and Linear
* building AI applications with resilient token streaming and multi-user sessions
* replacing hot/slow/expensive data fetching and database queries with sync
* building live, real-time dashboards
* hydrating data into edge workers and agents
* maintaining live local working sets for local analytics and local AI