dbt-projects-on-snowflake

dbt Projects on Snowflake

Deploy, manage, and monitor dbt projects natively within Snowflake using web-based workspaces, schema-level DBT PROJECT objects, and comprehensive event table telemetry.

Quick Start

Three Ways to Use dbt Projects:

1. Snowsight Workspaces - Web-based IDE for interactive development
2. DBT PROJECT Objects - Deployed projects for production execution
3. Snowflake CLI - Command-line deployment and execution

Setup

Complete setup instructions including prerequisites, external access integration, Git API integration, and event table configuration are in references/SETUP.md.

Deployment Methods

Method 1: Snowflake CLI (Recommended)

# Deploy project
snow dbt deploy my_project --source .

# Execute commands
snow dbt execute my_project run
snow dbt execute my_project build

Method 2: Snowsight

• Navigate to Projects → My Workspace
• Create new project from Git repository
• Configure profiles.yml
• Deploy as DBT PROJECT object

Method 3: SQL Execution

Execute directly in SQL:

EXECUTE DBT PROJECT <db>.<schema>.<project> args='build';
EXECUTE DBT PROJECT <db>.<schema>.<project> args='build --full-refresh';
EXECUTE DBT PROJECT <db>.<schema>.<project> args='build --select tag:gold';

Check and pin supported dbt versions

Run this to see the live list of versions currently available in the Snowflake managed runtime:

-- List the dbt versions supported by dbt Projects on Snowflake (Fusion + Core)
SELECT SYSTEM$SUPPORTED_DBT_VERSIONS();

SYSTEM$SUPPORTED_DBT_VERSIONS() returns each supported version along with its engine type. Use this instead of relying on a hardcoded number — preview builds advance frequently.

The DBT_VERSION attribute implicitly selects the engine:

• < 2.0 (e.g. 1.11.11) → dbt Core (Python engine)
• ≥ 2.0 (e.g. 2.0.0-preview.186) → dbt Fusion (Rust engine)

-- Set an account-wide default (a DBT_VERSION >= 2.0 selects the dbt Fusion engine)
ALTER ACCOUNT SET DEFAULT_DBT_VERSION = '2.0.0-preview.186';

-- Pin a project to a specific version at creation
CREATE OR REPLACE DBT PROJECT my_dbt_project
  FROM '@my_stage/dbt_files'
  DBT_VERSION = '2.0.0-preview.186';

-- Change an existing project's version
ALTER DBT PROJECT my_dbt_project SET DBT_VERSION = '2.0.0-preview.186';