DBMS > Apache Cassandra vs. Apache Ignite vs. FoundationDB

System Properties Comparison Apache Cassandra vs. Apache Ignite vs. FoundationDB

Please select another system to include it in the comparison.

Editorial information provided by DB-Engines

Name

Created as commercial project in 2013, FoundationDB has been acquired by Apple in March 2015 and was withdrawn from the market. As a consequence, the product was removed from the DB-Engines ranking. In April 2018, Apple open-sourced FoundationDB and it therefore reappears in the ranking.

Description

Wide-column store based on ideas of BigTable and DynamoDB

Optimized for write access

Apache Ignite is a memory-centric distributed database, caching, and processing platform for transactional, analytical, and streaming workloads, delivering in-memory speeds at petabyte scale.

Ordered key-value store. Core features are complimented by layers.

Primary database model

Wide column store

Key-value store
Relational DBMS

Document store

supported via specific layer
Key-value store
Relational DBMS

supported via specific SQL-layer

Secondary database models

Vector DBMS

starting with release V5

DB-Engines Ranking measures the popularity of database management systems
Trend Chart

Score	101.60
Rank	#11	Overall
	#1	Wide column stores

Score	2.85
Rank	#95	Overall
	#14	Key-value stores
	#49	Relational DBMS

Score	0.92
Rank	#195	Overall
	#32	Document stores
	#30	Key-value stores
	#90	Relational DBMS

Website

cassandra.apache.org

ignite.apache.org

github.com/apple/foundationdb

Technical documentation

cassandra.apache.org/doc/latest

apacheignite.readme.io/docs

apple.github.io/foundationdb

Developer

Apache Software Foundation

Apache top level project, originally developped by Facebook

Apache Software Foundation

FoundationDB

Initial release

2008

2015

2013

Current release

5.0-rc1, July 2024

2.16.0, December 2023

6.2.28, November 2020

License

Commercial or Open Source

Open Source

Apache version 2

Open Source

Apache 2.0

Open Source

Apache 2.0

Cloud-based only

Only available as a cloud service

DBaaS offerings (sponsored links)

Database as a Service

Providers of DBaaS offerings, please contact us to be listed.

Implementation language

Java

C++, Java, .Net

C++

Server operating systems

BSD
Linux
OS X
Windows

Linux
OS X
Solaris
Windows

Linux
OS X
Windows

Data scheme

schema-free

yes

schema-free

some layers support schemas

Typing

predefined data types such as float or date

yes

some layers support typing

XML support

Some form of processing data in XML format, e.g. support for XML data structures, and/or support for XPath, XQuery or XSLT.

yes

Secondary indexes

restricted

only equality queries, not always the best performing solution

yes

SQL

Support of SQL

SQL-like SELECT, DML and DDL statements (CQL)

ANSI-99 for query and DML statements, subset of DDL

supported in specific SQL layer only

APIs and other access methods

Proprietary protocol

CQL (Cassandra Query Language, an SQL-like language)
Thrift

HDFS API
Hibernate
JCache
JDBC
ODBC
Proprietary protocol
RESTful HTTP API
Spring Data

Supported programming languages

C#
C++
Clojure
Erlang
Go
Haskell
Java
JavaScript

Node.js
Perl
PHP
Python
Ruby
Scala

C#
C++
Java
PHP
Python
Ruby
Scala

.Net
C
C++
Go
Java
JavaScript

Node.js
PHP
Python
Ruby
Swift

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

yes (compute grid and cache interceptors can be used instead)

in SQL-layer only

Triggers

yes

yes (cache interceptors and events)

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

Sharding

no "single point of failure"

Sharding

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

selectable replication factor

Representation of geographical distribution of servers is possible

yes (replicated cache)

yes

MapReduce

Offers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methods

yes

yes (compute grid and hadoop accelerator)

Consistency concepts

Methods to ensure consistency in a distributed system

Eventual Consistency
Immediate Consistency

can be individually decided for each write operation

Immediate Consistency

Linearizable consistency

Foreign keys

Referential integrity

in SQL-layer only

Transaction concepts

Support to ensure data integrity after non-atomic manipulations of data

Atomicity and isolation are supported for single operations

ACID

Concurrency

Support for concurrent manipulation of data

yes

Durability

Support for making data persistent

yes

In-memory capabilities

Is there an option to define some or all structures to be held in-memory only.

yes

User concepts

Access control

Access rights for users can be defined per object

Security Hooks for custom implementations

More information provided by the system vendor

We invite representatives of system vendors to contact us for updating and extending the system information,
and for displaying vendor-provided information such as key customers, competitive advantages and market metrics.

Related products and services

We invite representatives of vendors of related products to contact us for presenting information about their offerings here.

More resources

Recent citations in the news

Introducing Apache Cassandra®-compatible APIs in Spanner for zero-code-change migration
15 May 2025, Google Cloud

Use AWS FIS to test the resilience of self-managed Cassandra | Amazon Web Services
25 June 2025, Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Migrating NoSQL Databases: Real-World Lessons Learned
7 January 2026, The New Stack

Robust Database Backup Recovery at Uber
22 May 2025, Uber

IBM to buy Cassandra DBaaS specialist DataStax
25 February 2025, thestack.technology

provided by Google News

GridGain Announces the Virtual Apache Ignite Summit 2026 and Opens Call For Speakers
4 February 2026, Yahoo Finance

Announcing the Ignite Summit 2025 Conference Schedule
20 February 2025, PR Newswire

What is Apache Ignite? How is Apache Ignite Used?
18 July 2022, thestack.technology

GridGain In-Memory Data Fabric Becomes Apache Ignite
9 April 2015, Linux.com

Apache Ignite: An Overview
6 September 2023, Open Source For You

provided by Google News

FoundationDB: A Distributed Database That Can’t Be Killed
25 July 2025, The New Stack

How FoundationDB Powers Snowflake Metadata Forward
19 April 2018, Snowflake

Apple Acquires Durable Database Company FoundationDB
24 March 2015, TechCrunch

Apple-owned FoundationDB open sources the core technology at the heart of iCloud
19 April 2018, AppleInsider

FoundationDB Record Layer: A Multi-Tenant Structured Datastore
25 July 2020, Apple Machine Learning Research

provided by Google News

Share this page