DBMS > CouchDB vs. PostGIS vs. RethinkDB

System Properties Comparison CouchDB vs. PostGIS vs. RethinkDB

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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.

Spatial extension of PostgreSQL

DBMS for the Web with a mechanism to push updated query results to applications in realtime.

Primary database model

Document store

Spatial DBMS

Document store

Secondary database models

Spatial DBMS

using the Geocouch extension

Relational DBMS

Spatial DBMS

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

Score	6.60
Rank	#53	Overall
	#9	Document stores

Score	18.94
Rank	#30	Overall
	#1	Spatial DBMS

Score	2.30
Rank	#105	Overall
	#19	Document stores

Website

couchdb.apache.org

postgis.net

rethinkdb.com

Technical documentation

docs.couchdb.org/en/stable

postgis.net/documentation

rethinkdb.com/docs

Developer

Apache Software Foundation

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

The Linux Foundation

since July 2017

Initial release

2005

2009

Current release

3.3.3, December 2023

3.4.2, February 2024

2.4.1, August 2020

License

Commercial or Open Source

Open Source

Apache version 2

Open Source

GPL v2.0

Open Source

Apache Version 2

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

Erlang

C++

Server operating systems

Android
BSD
Linux
OS X
Solaris
Windows

Linux
OS X
Windows

Data scheme

schema-free

yes

schema-free

Typing

predefined data types such as float or date

yes

string, binary, float, bool, date, geometry

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

yes

via views

yes

SQL

Support of SQL

yes

APIs and other access methods

RESTful HTTP/JSON API

Supported programming languages

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

community-supported driver
C#

community-supported driver
C++

community-supported driver
Clojure

community-supported driver
Dart

community-supported driver
Erlang

community-supported driver
Go

community-supported driver
Haskell

community-supported driver
Java

official driver
JavaScript (Node.js)

official driver
Lisp

community-supported driver
Lua

community-supported driver
Objective-C

community-supported driver
Perl

community-supported driver
PHP

community-supported driver
Python

official driver
Ruby

official driver
Scala

community-supported driver

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

View functions in JavaScript

user defined functions

Triggers

yes

Client-side triggers through changefeeds

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

Sharding

improved architecture with release 2.0

yes

based on PostgreSQL

Sharding

range based

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

Multi-source replication
Source-replica replication

yes

based on PostgreSQL

Source-replica replication

MapReduce

Offers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methods

yes

Consistency concepts

Methods to ensure consistency in a distributed system

Eventual Consistency

Immediate Consistency

Foreign keys

Referential integrity

yes

Transaction concepts

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

atomic operations within a single document possible

ACID

Atomic single-document operations

Concurrency

Support for concurrent manipulation of data

yes

strategy: optimistic locking

yes

MVCC based

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.

User concepts

Access control

Access rights for users can be defined per database

yes

based on PostgreSQL

yes

users and table-level permissions

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More resources

DB-Engines blog posts

Couchbase climbs up the DB-Engines Ranking, increasing its popularity by 10% every month
2 June 2014, Matthias Gelbmann

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Spatial database management systems
6 April 2021, Matthias Gelbmann

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Meet some database management systems you are likely to hear more about in the future
4 August 2014, Paul Andlinger

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Recent citations in the news

CouchDB Update Brings QuickJS Engine Option - 4~5x Faster Than SpiderMonkey
27 September 2024, Phoronix

I made my own Obsidian Sync server with my NAS and a free plugin, and it works perfectly
9 May 2025, XDA

Using a NoSQL Database to Manage Information in a Modern Retail Environment
7 September 2024, IBM

How to install the CouchDB NoSQL database on Debian Server 11
16 June 2022, TechRepublic

IBM Cloudant pulls plan to fund new foundational layer for CouchDB
15 March 2022, theregister.com

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How to Use RethinkDB with Node.js Applications
7 November 2024, SitePoint

An introduction to building realtime apps with RethinkDB
4 June 2015, devmio

Stripe acquires team behind NoSQL database startup RethinkDB
5 October 2016, VentureBeat

RethinkDB is dead, and MongoDB isn’t what killed it
24 January 2017, TechRepublic

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17 April 2017, Crunchbase News

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