diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index 74d069e2..fe171292 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -76,8 +76,8 @@ ifeq ($(RUN_LONG_TESTS), yes)
 	if [ ! -e ~/aptly-fixture-db ]; then git clone https://github.com/aptly-dev/aptly-fixture-db.git ~/aptly-fixture-db/; fi
 	if [ ! -e ~/aptly-fixture-pool ]; then git clone https://github.com/aptly-dev/aptly-fixture-pool.git ~/aptly-fixture-pool/; fi
 	# TODO: maybe we can skip imgrading levledb data to etcd
-	PATH=$(BINPATH)/:$(PATH) && . system/env/bin/activate && APTLY_VERSION=$(VERSION) $(PYTHON) system/leveldb2etcd.py --datadir ~/aptly-fixture-db
-	PATH=$(BINPATH)/:$(PATH) && . system/env/bin/activate && APTLY_ETCD_DATABASE="127.0.0.1:2379" APTLY_VERSION=$(VERSION) $(PYTHON) system/run.py --long $(TESTS)
+	PATH=$(BINPATH)/:$(PATH) && . system/env/bin/activate && $(PYTHON) system/leveldb2etcd.py --datadir ~/aptly-fixture-db
+	PATH=$(BINPATH)/:$(PATH) && . system/env/bin/activate && APTLY_DATABASE_TYPE="etcd" APTLY_DATABASE_URL="127.0.0.1:2379" APTLY_VERSION=$(VERSION) $(PYTHON) system/run.py --long $(TESTS)
 endif
 
 bench:
diff --git a/context/context.go b/context/context.go
index 7f17b84d..8838f26b 100644
--- a/context/context.go
+++ b/context/context.go
@@ -3,6 +3,7 @@ package context
 
 import (
 	gocontext "context"
+	"errors"
 	"fmt"
 	"math/rand"
 	"os"
@@ -289,8 +290,15 @@ func (context *AptlyContext) _database() (database.Storage, error) {
 	if context.database == nil {
 		var err error
 
-		if context.config().DatabaseEtcd != "" {
-			context.database, err = etcddb.NewDB(context.config().DatabaseEtcd)
+		if context.config().DatabaseBackend.Type == "etcd" {
+			context.database, err = etcddb.NewDB(context.config().DatabaseBackend.URL)
+		} else if context.config().DatabaseBackend.Type == "leveldb" {
+			if context.config().DatabaseBackend.DbPath != "" {
+				dbPath := filepath.Join(context.config().RootDir, context.config().DatabaseBackend.DbPath)
+				context.database, err = goleveldb.NewDB(dbPath)
+			} else {
+				return nil, errors.New("leveldb databaseBackend config invalid")
+			}
 		} else {
 			context.database, err = goleveldb.NewDB(context.dbPath())
 		}
diff --git a/man/aptly.1.ronn.tmpl b/man/aptly.1.ronn.tmpl
index f892ef91..c7d7a076 100644
--- a/man/aptly.1.ronn.tmpl
+++ b/man/aptly.1.ronn.tmpl
@@ -28,7 +28,10 @@ Configuration file is stored in JSON format (default values shown below):
 
     {
       "rootDir": "$HOME/.aptly",
-      "databaseEtcd": "",
+      "databaseBackend": {
+        "type": "",
+        "url": ""
+      },
       "downloadConcurrency": 4,
       "downloadSpeedLimit": 0,
       "downloadRetries": 0,
@@ -120,8 +123,8 @@ Options:
     the default for downloaded packages (`rootDir`/pool) and
     the default for published repositories (`rootDir`/public)
 
-  * `databaseEtcd`:
-    the etcd database connection address is empty by default, which means it is not used
+  * `databaseBackend`:
+    the database config; if this config is empty, use levledb backend by default
 
   * `downloadConcurrency`:
     is a number of parallel download threads to use when downloading packages
diff --git a/system/lib.py b/system/lib.py
index 98d86d32..d4ce5e25 100644
--- a/system/lib.py
+++ b/system/lib.py
@@ -133,9 +133,17 @@ class BaseTest(object):
     aptlyDir = ".aptly"
     aptlyConfigFile = ".aptly.conf"
     expectedCode = 0
-    databaseEtcd = os.environ.get("APTLY_ETCD_DATABASE")
-    if databaseEtcd is None:
-        databaseEtcd = ""
+    databaseType = os.environ.get("APTLY_DATABASE_TYPE")
+    databaseUrl = os.environ.get("APTLY_DATABASE_URL")
+    if databaseType is None:
+        databaseType = ""
+    if databaseUrl is None:
+        databaseUrl = ""
+
+    databaseBackend = {
+        "type": databaseType,
+        "url": databaseUrl,
+    }
 
     configFile = {
         "rootDir": f"{os.environ['HOME']}/{aptlyDir}",
@@ -157,6 +165,7 @@ class BaseTest(object):
         "logFormat": "default",
         "serveInAPIMode": True,
         "databaseEtcd": databaseEtcd,
+        "databaseBackend": databaseBackend,
     }
     configOverride = {}
     environmentOverride = {}
diff --git a/system/t02_config/ConfigShowTest_gold b/system/t02_config/ConfigShowTest_gold
index 58c65bf9..ad12f307 100644
--- a/system/t02_config/ConfigShowTest_gold
+++ b/system/t02_config/ConfigShowTest_gold
@@ -30,5 +30,6 @@
     "logLevel": "debug",
     "logFormat": "default",
     "serveInAPIMode": true,
-    "databaseEtcd": ""
+    "databaseEtcd": "",
+    "databaseBackend": {}
 }
diff --git a/system/t02_config/CreateConfigTest_gold b/system/t02_config/CreateConfigTest_gold
index 2aaf7c64..24bed7f6 100644
--- a/system/t02_config/CreateConfigTest_gold
+++ b/system/t02_config/CreateConfigTest_gold
@@ -30,5 +30,6 @@
   "logLevel": "debug",
   "logFormat": "default",
   "serveInAPIMode": false,
-  "databaseEtcd": ""
+  "databaseEtcd": "",
+  "databaseBackend": {}
 }
diff --git a/utils/config.go b/utils/config.go
index e9ebc536..29940811 100644
--- a/utils/config.go
+++ b/utils/config.go
@@ -41,6 +41,14 @@ type ConfigStructure struct { // nolint: maligned
 	LogFormat              string                           `json:"logFormat"`
 	ServeInAPIMode         bool                             `json:"serveInAPIMode"`
 	DatabaseEtcd           string                           `json:"databaseEtcd"`
+	DatabaseBackend        DBConfig                         `json:"databaseBackend"`
+}
+
+// DBConfig
+type DBConfig struct {
+	Type   string `json:"type"`
+	URL    string `json:"url"`
+	DbPath string `json:"dbPath"`
 }
 
 type LocalPoolStorage struct {
diff --git a/utils/config_test.go b/utils/config_test.go
index 3036e8a8..8760c90c 100644
--- a/utils/config_test.go
+++ b/utils/config_test.go
@@ -144,7 +144,11 @@ func (s *ConfigSuite) TestSaveConfig(c *C) {
 		"  \"logLevel\": \"info\",\n"+
 		"  \"logFormat\": \"json\",\n"+
 		"  \"serveInAPIMode\": false,\n"+
-		"  \"databaseEtcd\": \"\"\n"+
+		"  \"databaseEtcd\": \"\",\n"+
+		"  \"databaseBackend\": {\n"+
+		"    \"type\": \"\",\n"+
+		"    \"url\": \"\"\n"+
+		"  }\n"+
 		"}")
 }