DBMS > CouchDB vs. Memcached vs. MongoDB vs. Redis vs. ScyllaDB

System Properties Comparison CouchDB vs. Memcached vs. MongoDB vs. Redis vs. ScyllaDB

Editorial information provided by DB-Engines

Name

Description

A native JSON - document store inspired by Lotus Notes, scalable from globally distributed server-clusters down to mobile phones.

In-memory key-value store, originally intended for caching

One of the most popular document stores available both as a fully managed cloud service and for deployment on self-managed infrastructure

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.

Cassandra and DynamoDB compatible wide column store

Primary database model

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

Wide column store

Secondary database models

Spatial DBMS

using the Geocouch extension

Spatial DBMS
Search engine

integrated Lucene index, currently in MongoDB Atlas only.
Time Series DBMS

Time Series Collections introduced in Release 5.0
Vector DBMS

currently available in the MongoDB Atlas cloud service only

Document store

with RedisJSON
Graph DBMS

with RedisGraph
Spatial DBMS
Search engine

with RediSearch
Time Series DBMS

with RedisTimeSeries
Vector DBMS

Key-value store

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

Score	9.30
Rank	#45	Overall
	#7	Document stores

Score	19.42
Rank	#32	Overall
	#4	Key-value stores

Score	421.65
Rank	#5	Overall
	#1	Document stores

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

Score	4.75
Rank	#68	Overall
	#5	Wide column stores

Website

Technical documentation

docs.couchdb.org/en/stable

github.com/memcached/memcached/wiki

www.mongodb.com/docs/manual

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

docs.scylladb.com

Developer

Apache Software Foundation

Apache top-level project, originally developed by Damien Katz, a former Lotus Notes developer

Danga Interactive

originally developed by Brad Fitzpatrick for LiveJournal

MongoDB, Inc

Redis project core team, inspired by Salvatore Sanfilippo

Development sponsored by Redis Inc.

ScyllaDB

Initial release

2005

2003

2009

2015

Current release

3.3.3, December 2023

1.6.25, March 2024

6.0.7, June 2023

7.2.4, January 2024

ScyllaDB Open Source 5.4.1, January 2024

License

Commercial or Open Source

Open Source

Apache version 2

Open Source

BSD license

Open Source

MongoDB Inc.'s Server Side Public License v1. Prior versions were published under GNU AGPL v3.0. Commercial licenses are also available.

Open Source

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

Open Source

Open Source (AGPL), commercial license available

Cloud-based only

Only available as a cloud service

MongoDB available as DBaaS (MongoDB Atlas)

DBaaS offerings (sponsored links)

Database as a Service

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

MongoDB Atlas: Global multi-cloud database with unmatched data distribution and mobility across AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud, built-in automation for resource and workload optimization, and so much more.

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

Scylla Cloud: Create real-time applications that run at global scale with Scylla Cloud, the industry’s most powerful NoSQL DBaaS

Implementation language

Erlang

C++

Server operating systems

Android
BSD
Linux
OS X
Solaris
Windows

FreeBSD
Linux
OS X
Unix
Windows

Linux
OS X
Solaris
Windows

BSD
Linux
OS X
Windows

ported and maintained by Microsoft Open Technologies, Inc.

Linux

Data scheme

schema-free

Although schema-free, documents of the same collection often follow the same structure. Optionally impose all or part of a schema by defining a JSON schema.

schema-free

Typing

predefined data types such as float or date

yes

string, integer, double, decimal, boolean, date, object_id, geospatial

partial

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

yes

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

via views

yes

with RediSearch module

yes

cluster global secondary indices

SQL

Support of SQL

Read-only SQL queries via the MongoDB Atlas SQL Interface

with RediSQL module

SQL-like DML and DDL statements (CQL)

APIs and other access methods

RESTful HTTP/JSON API

Proprietary protocol

GraphQL
HTTP REST
Prisma
proprietary protocol using JSON

proprietary protocol

RESP - REdis Serialization Protocol

Proprietary protocol (CQL)

compatible with CQL (Cassandra Query Language, an SQL-like language)
RESTful HTTP API (DynamoDB compatible)
Thrift

Supported programming languages

C
C#
ColdFusion
Erlang
Haskell
Java
JavaScript
Lisp
Lua
Objective-C
OCaml
Perl
PHP
PL/SQL
Python
Ruby
Smalltalk

.Net
C
C++
ColdFusion
Erlang
Java
Lisp
Lua
OCaml
Perl
PHP
Python
Ruby

Actionscript

unofficial driver
C
C#
C++
Clojure

unofficial driver
ColdFusion

unofficial driver
D

unofficial driver
Dart

unofficial driver
Delphi

unofficial driver
Erlang
Go
Groovy

unofficial driver
Haskell
Java
JavaScript
Kotlin
Lisp

unofficial driver
Lua

unofficial driver
MatLab

unofficial driver
Perl
PHP
PowerShell

unofficial driver
Prolog

unofficial driver
Python
R

unofficial driver
Ruby
Rust
Scala
Smalltalk

unofficial driver
Swift

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

For CQL interface: C#, C++, Clojure, Erlang, Go, Haskell, Java, JavaScript, Node.js, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby, Rust, Scala
For DynamoDB interface: .Net, ColdFusion, Erlang, Groovy, Java, JavaScript, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

View functions in JavaScript

JavaScript

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

yes, Lua

Triggers

yes

in MongoDB Atlas only

publish/subscribe channels provide some trigger functionality; RedisGears

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

Sharding

improved architecture with release 2.0

none

Sharding

Partitioned by hashed, ranged, or zoned sharding keys. Live resharding allows users to change their shard keys as an online operation with zero downtime.

Sharding

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

Sharding

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

Multi-source replication
Source-replica replication

none

Repcached, a Memcached patch, provides this functionallity

Multi-Source deployments with MongoDB Atlas Global Clusters
Source-replica replication

Multi-source replication

with Redis Enterprise Pack
Source-replica replication

Chained replication is supported

selectable replication factor

Representation of geographical distribution of servers is possible

MapReduce

Offers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methods

yes

through RedisGears

Consistency concepts

Methods to ensure consistency in a distributed system

Eventual Consistency

can be individually decided for each read operation
Immediate Consistency

default behaviour

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

Eventual Consistency
Tunable Consistency

can be individually decided for each write operation

Foreign keys

Referential integrity

typically not used, however similar functionality with DBRef possible

Transaction concepts

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

atomic operations within a single document possible

Multi-document ACID Transactions with snapshot isolation

Atomic execution of command blocks and scripts and optimistic locking

Atomicity and isolation are supported for single operations

Concurrency

Support for concurrent manipulation of data

yes

strategy: optimistic locking

yes

Data access is serialized by the server

yes

Durability

Support for making data persistent

yes

optional, enabled by default

yes

Configurable mechanisms for persistency via snapshots and/or operations logs

yes

In-memory capabilities

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

yes

In-memory storage engine introduced with MongoDB version 3.2

yes

in-memory tables

User concepts

Access control

Access rights for users can be defined per database

yes

using SASL (Simple Authentication and Security Layer) protocol

Access rights for users and roles

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

Access rights for users can be defined per object

More information provided by the system vendor

Specific characteristics

MongoDB provides an integrated suite of cloud database and data services to accelerate...
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ScyllaDB is engineered to deliver predictable performance at scale. It’s adopted...
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Competitive advantages

Built around the flexible document data model and unified API, MongoDB is a developer...
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Highly-performant (efficiently utilizes full resources of a node and network; millions...
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Typical application scenarios

AI-enriched intelligent apps (Continental, Telefonica, Iron Mountain) Internet of...
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ScyllaDB is ideal for applications that require high throughput and low latency at...
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Key customers

ADP, Adobe, Amadeus, AstraZeneca, Auto Trader, Barclays, BBVA, Bosch, Cisco, CERN,...
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Discord, Epic Games, Expedia, Zillow, Comcast, Disney+ Hotstar, Samsung, ShareChat,...
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Market metrics

Hundreds of millions downloads, over 150,000+ Atlas clusters provisioned every month...
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ScyllaDB typically offers ~75% total cost of ownership savings, with ~5X higher throughput...
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Licensing and pricing models

MongoDB database server: Server-Side Public License (SSPL) . Commercial licenses...
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ScyllaDB Open Source - free open source software (AGPL) ScyllaDB Enterprise - subscription-based...
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