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DBMS > Google Cloud Spanner vs. Lovefield vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. PostgreSQL

System Properties Comparison Google Cloud Spanner vs. Lovefield vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. PostgreSQL

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Editorial information provided by DB-Engines
NameGoogle Cloud Spanner  Xexclude from comparisonLovefield  Xexclude from comparisonMicrosoft SQL Server  Xexclude from comparisonPostgreSQL  Xexclude from comparison
DescriptionA horizontally scalable, globally consistent, relational database service. It is the externalization of the core Google database that runs the biggest aspects of Google, like Ads and Google Play.Embeddable relational database for web apps written in pure JavaScriptMicrosofts flagship relational DBMSWidely used open source RDBMS infoDeveloped as objectoriented DBMS (Postgres), gradually enhanced with 'standards' like SQL
Primary database modelRelational DBMSRelational DBMSRelational DBMSRelational DBMS infowith object oriented extensions, e.g.: user defined types/functions and inheritance. Handling of key/value pairs with hstore module.
Secondary database modelsDocument store
Graph DBMS
Spatial DBMS
Document store
Graph DBMS infowith Apache Age
Spatial DBMS
Vector DBMS infowith pgvector extension
DB-Engines Ranking infomeasures the popularity of database management systemsranking trend
Trend Chart
Score2.89
Rank#105  Overall
#53  Relational DBMS
Score0.32
Rank#290  Overall
#132  Relational DBMS
Score829.80
Rank#3  Overall
#3  Relational DBMS
Score645.05
Rank#4  Overall
#4  Relational DBMS
Websitecloud.google.com/­spannergoogle.github.io/­lovefieldwww.microsoft.com/­en-us/­sql-serverwww.postgresql.org
Technical documentationcloud.google.com/­spanner/­docsgithub.com/­google/­lovefield/­blob/­master/­docs/­spec_index.mdlearn.microsoft.com/­en-US/­sql/­sql-serverwww.postgresql.org/­docs
DeveloperGoogleGoogleMicrosoftPostgreSQL Global Development Group infowww.postgresql.org/­developer
Initial release2017201419891989 info1989: Postgres, 1996: PostgreSQL
Current release2.1.12, February 2017SQL Server 2022, November 202216.2, February 2024
License infoCommercial or Open SourcecommercialOpen Source infoApache 2.0commercial inforestricted free version is availableOpen Source infoBSD
Cloud-based only infoOnly available as a cloud serviceyesnonono
DBaaS offerings (sponsored links) infoDatabase as a Service

Providers of DBaaS offerings, please contact us to be listed.
Aiven for PostgreSQL: Fully managed PostgreSQL for developers with 70+ extensions and flexible orchestration tools.
Implementation languageJavaScriptC++C
Server operating systemshostedserver-less, requires a JavaScript environment (browser, Node.js) infotested with Chrome, Firefox, IE, SafariLinux
Windows
FreeBSD
HP-UX
Linux
NetBSD
OpenBSD
OS X
Solaris
Unix
Windows
Data schemeyesyesyesyes
Typing infopredefined data types such as float or dateyesyesyesyes
XML support infoSome form of processing data in XML format, e.g. support for XML data structures, and/or support for XPath, XQuery or XSLT.nonoyesyes infospecific XML-type available, but no XML query functionality.
Secondary indexesyesyesyesyes
SQL infoSupport of SQLyes infoQuery statements complying to ANSI 2011SQL-like query language infovia JavaScript builder patternyesyes infostandard with numerous extensions
APIs and other access methodsgRPC (using protocol buffers) API
JDBC infoAt present, JDBC supports read-only queries. No support for DDL or DML statements.
RESTful HTTP API
ADO.NET
JDBC
ODBC
OLE DB
Tabular Data Stream (TDS)
ADO.NET
JDBC
native C library
ODBC
streaming API for large objects
Supported programming languagesGo
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
Python
JavaScriptC#
C++
Delphi
Go
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
PHP
Python
R
Ruby
Visual Basic
.Net
C
C++
Delphi
Java infoJDBC
JavaScript (Node.js)
Perl
PHP
Python
Tcl
Server-side scripts infoStored proceduresnonoTransact SQL, .NET languages, R, Python and (with SQL Server 2019) Javauser defined functions inforealized in proprietary language PL/pgSQL or with common languages like Perl, Python, Tcl etc.
TriggersnoUsing read-only observersyesyes
Partitioning methods infoMethods for storing different data on different nodesShardingnonetables can be distributed across several files (horizontal partitioning); sharding through federationpartitioning by range, list and (since PostgreSQL 11) by hash
Replication methods infoMethods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodesMulti-source replication with 3 replicas for regional instances.noneyes, but depending on the SQL-Server EditionSource-replica replication infoother methods possible by using 3rd party extensions
MapReduce infoOffers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methodsyes infousing Google Cloud Dataflownonono
Consistency concepts infoMethods to ensure consistency in a distributed systemImmediate ConsistencyImmediate ConsistencyImmediate Consistency
Foreign keys infoReferential integrityyes infoby using interleaved tables, this features focuses more on performance improvements than on referential integrityyesyesyes
Transaction concepts infoSupport to ensure data integrity after non-atomic manipulations of dataACID infoStrict serializable isolationACIDACIDACID
Concurrency infoSupport for concurrent manipulation of datayesyesyesyes
Durability infoSupport for making data persistentyesyes, by using IndexedDB or the cloud service Firebase Realtime Databaseyesyes
In-memory capabilities infoIs there an option to define some or all structures to be held in-memory only.noyes infousing MemoryDByesno
User concepts infoAccess controlAccess rights for users, groups and roles based on Google Cloud Identity and Access Management (IAM)nofine grained access rights according to SQL-standardfine grained access rights according to SQL-standard

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More resources
Google Cloud SpannerLovefieldMicrosoft SQL ServerPostgreSQL
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