DBMS > Apache Impala vs. Datomic vs. Neo4j vs. QuestDB vs. Redis

System Properties Comparison Apache Impala vs. Datomic vs. Neo4j vs. QuestDB vs. Redis

Editorial information provided by DB-Engines

Name

Description

Analytic DBMS for Hadoop

Datomic builds on immutable values, supports point-in-time queries and uses 3rd party systems for durability

Scalable, ACID-compliant graph database designed with a high-performance distributed cluster architecture, available in self-hosted and cloud offerings

A high performance open source SQL database for time series data

Popular in-memory data platform used as a cache, message broker, and database that can be deployed on-premises, across clouds, and hybrid environments

Redis focuses on performance so most of its design decisions prioritize high performance and very low latencies.

Primary database model

Multiple data types and a rich set of operations, as well as configurable data expiration, eviction and persistence

Secondary database models

Document store

Relational DBMS

Document store

with RedisJSON
Graph DBMS

with RedisGraph
Spatial DBMS
Search engine

with RediSearch
Time Series DBMS

with RedisTimeSeries
Vector DBMS

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

Score	13.77
Rank	#40	Overall
	#24	Relational DBMS

Score	1.59
Rank	#150	Overall
	#69	Relational DBMS

Score	44.46
Rank	#23	Overall
	#1	Graph DBMS

Score	2.52
Rank	#109	Overall
	#9	Time Series DBMS

Score	157.80
Rank	#6	Overall
	#1	Key-value stores

Website

Technical documentation

impala.apache.org/impala-docs.html

docs.datomic.com

neo4j.com/docs

questdb.io/docs

docs.redis.com/latest/index.html
redis.io/docs

Developer

Apache Software Foundation

Apache top-level project, originally developed by Cloudera

Cognitect

Neo4j, Inc.

QuestDB Technology Inc

Redis project core team, inspired by Salvatore Sanfilippo

Development sponsored by Redis Inc.

Initial release

2013

2012

2007

2014

2009

Current release

4.1.0, June 2022

1.0.6735, June 2023

5.19, April 2024

7.2.4, January 2024

License

Commercial or Open Source

Open Source

Apache Version 2

commercial

limited edition free

Open Source

GPL version3, commercial licenses available

Open Source

Apache 2.0

Open Source

source-available extensions (modules), commercial licenses for Redis Enterprise

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.

Neo4j Aura: Neo4j’s fully managed cloud service: The zero-admin, always-on graph database for cloud developers.

Aiven for Redis: Fully managed in-memory key-value store for all your caching and speedy lookup needs.

Implementation language

C++

Java, Clojure

Java, Scala

Java (Zero-GC), C++, Rust

Server operating systems

Linux

All OS with a Java VM

Linux

Can also be used server-less as embedded Java database.
OS X
Solaris
Windows

Linux
macOS
Windows

BSD
Linux
OS X
Windows

ported and maintained by Microsoft Open Technologies, Inc.

Data scheme

yes

schema-free and schema-optional

yes

schema-free via InfluxDB Line Protocol

schema-free

Typing

predefined data types such as float or date

yes

partial

Supported data types are strings, hashes, lists, sets and sorted sets, bit arrays, hyperloglogs and geospatial indexes

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.

Secondary indexes

yes

pluggable indexing subsystem, by default Apache Lucene

yes

with RediSearch module

SQL

Support of SQL

SQL-like DML and DDL statements

SQL with time-series extensions

with RediSQL module

APIs and other access methods

JDBC
ODBC

RESTful HTTP API

Bolt protocol
Cypher query language
Java API
Neo4j-OGM

Object Graph Mapper
RESTful HTTP API
Spring Data Neo4j
TinkerPop 3

HTTP REST
InfluxDB Line Protocol (TCP/UDP)
JDBC
PostgreSQL wire protocol

proprietary protocol

RESP - REdis Serialization Protocol

Supported programming languages

All languages supporting JDBC/ODBC

Clojure
Java

.Net
Clojure
Elixir
Go
Groovy
Haskell
Java
JavaScript
Perl
PHP
Python
Ruby
Scala

PostgreSQL driver
C++
Go
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
Python
Rust

over HTTP

C
C#
C++
Clojure
Crystal
D
Dart
Elixir
Erlang
Fancy
Go
Haskell
Haxe
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
Lisp
Lua
MatLab
Objective-C
OCaml
Pascal
Perl
PHP
Prolog
Pure Data
Python
R
Rebol
Ruby
Rust
Scala
Scheme
Smalltalk
Swift
Tcl
Visual Basic

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

yes

user defined functions and integration of map-reduce

yes

Transaction Functions

yes

User defined Procedures and Functions

Lua; Redis Functions coming in Redis 7 (slides and Github)

Triggers

By using transaction functions

yes

via event handler

publish/subscribe channels provide some trigger functionality; RedisGears

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

Sharding

none

But extensive use of caching in the application peers

yes using Neo4j Fabric

horizontal partitioning (by timestamps)

Sharding

Automatic hash-based sharding with support for hash-tags for manual sharding

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

selectable replication factor

none

But extensive use of caching in the application peers

Causal Clustering using Raft protocol

available in in Enterprise Version only

Source-replica replication with eventual consistency

Multi-source replication

with Redis Enterprise Pack
Source-replica replication

Chained replication is supported

MapReduce

Offers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methods

yes

query execution via MapReduce

through RedisGears

Consistency concepts

Methods to ensure consistency in a distributed system

Eventual Consistency

Immediate Consistency

Causal and Eventual Consistency configurable in Causal Cluster setup
Immediate Consistency in stand-alone mode

Immediate Consistency

Eventual Consistency
Causal consistency can be enabled in Active-Active databases
Strong consistency with Redis Raft
Strong eventual consistency with Active-Active

Foreign keys

Referential integrity

yes

Relationships in graphs

Transaction concepts

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

ACID

ACID for single-table writes

Atomic execution of command blocks and scripts and optimistic locking

Concurrency

Support for concurrent manipulation of data

yes

Data access is serialized by the server

Durability

Support for making data persistent

yes

using external storage systems (e.g. Cassandra, DynamoDB, PostgreSQL, Couchbase and others)

yes

Configurable mechanisms for persistency via snapshots and/or operations logs

In-memory capabilities

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

yes

recommended only for testing and development

yes

through memory mapped files

yes

User concepts

Access control

Access rights for users, groups and roles

based on Apache Sentry and Kerberos

Users, roles and permissions. Pluggable authentication with supported standards (LDAP, Active Directory, Kerberos)

Access Control Lists (ACLs): redis.io/docs/management/security/acl
LDAP and Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) for Redis Enterprise
Mutual TLS authentication: redis.io/docs/management/security/encryption
Password-based authentication

More information provided by the system vendor

Specific characteristics

Neo4j delivers graph technology that has been battle tested for performance and scale...
» more

Relational model with native time series support Column-based storage and time partitioned...
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Competitive advantages

Neo4j is the market leader, graph database category creator, and the most widely...
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High ingestion throughput: peak of 4M rows/sec (TSBS Benchmark) Code optimizations...
» more

Typical application scenarios

Real-Time Recommendations Master Data Management Identity and Access Management Network...
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Financial tick data Industrial IoT Application Metrics Monitoring
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Key customers

Over 800 commercial customers and over 4300 startups use Neo4j. Flagship customers...
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Banks & Hedge funds, Yahoo, OKX, Airbus, Aquis Exchange, Net App, Cloudera, Airtel,...
» more

Market metrics

Neo4j boasts the world's largest graph database ecosystem with more than 140 million...
» more

Licensing and pricing models

GPL v3 license that can be used all the places where you might use MySQL. Neo4j Commercial...
» more

Open source Apache 2.0 QuestDB Enterprise QuestDB Cloud
» more

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and for displaying vendor-provided information such as key customers, competitive advantages and market metrics.