DBMS > GraphDB vs. RDF4J vs. Redis vs. Spark SQL vs. TinkerGraph

System Properties Comparison GraphDB vs. RDF4J vs. Redis vs. Spark SQL vs. TinkerGraph

Editorial information provided by DB-Engines

Name

Description

Enterprise-ready RDF and graph database with efficient reasoning, cluster and external index synchronization support. It supports also SQL JDBC access to Knowledge Graph and GraphQL over SPARQL.

RDF4J is a Java framework for processing RDF data, supporting both memory-based and a disk-based storage.

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.

Spark SQL is a component on top of 'Spark Core' for structured data processing

A lightweight, in-memory graph engine that serves as a reference implementation of the TinkerPop3 API

Primary database model

Graph DBMS
RDF store

RDF store

Key-value store

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

Relational DBMS

Graph DBMS

Secondary database models

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	3.32
Rank	#91	Overall
	#6	Graph DBMS
	#4	RDF stores

Score	0.69
Rank	#230	Overall
	#9	RDF stores

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

Score	18.96
Rank	#33	Overall
	#20	Relational DBMS

Score	0.08
Rank	#348	Overall
	#35	Graph DBMS

Website

tinkerpop.apache.org/docs/current/reference/#tinkergraph-gremlin

Technical documentation

graphdb.ontotext.com/documentation

rdf4j.org/documentation

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

spark.apache.org/docs/latest/sql-programming-guide.html

Social network pages

Developer

Ontotext

Since 2016 officially forked into an Eclipse project, former developer was Aduna Software.

Redis project core team, inspired by Salvatore Sanfilippo

Development sponsored by Redis Inc.

Apache Software Foundation

Initial release

2000

2004

2009

2014

2009

Current release

10.4, October 2023

7.2.4, January 2024

3.5.0 ( 2.13), September 2023

License

Commercial or Open Source

commercial

Some plugins of GraphDB Workbench are open sourced

Open Source

Eclipse Distribution License (EDL), v1.0.

Open Source

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

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.

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

Implementation language

Java

Scala

Java

Server operating systems

All OS with a Java VM
Linux
OS X
Windows

Linux
OS X
Unix
Windows

BSD
Linux
OS X
Windows

ported and maintained by Microsoft Open Technologies, Inc.

Linux
OS X
Windows

Data scheme

schema-free and OWL/RDFS-schema support; RDF shapes

yes

RDF Schemas

schema-free

yes

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

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, supports real-time synchronization and indexing in SOLR/Elastic search/Lucene and GeoSPARQL geometry data indexes

yes

with RediSearch module

SQL

Support of SQL

stored SPARQL accessed as SQL using Apache Calcite through JDBC/ODBC

with RediSQL module

SQL-like DML and DDL statements

APIs and other access methods

GeoSPARQL
GraphQL
GraphQL Federation
Java API
JDBC
RDF4J API
RDFS
RIO
Sail API
Sesame REST HTTP Protocol
SPARQL 1.1

Java API
RIO

RDF Input/Output
Sail API
SeRQL

Sesame RDF Query Language
Sesame REST HTTP Protocol
SPARQL

proprietary protocol

RESP - REdis Serialization Protocol

JDBC
ODBC

TinkerPop 3

Supported programming languages

.Net
C#
Clojure
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
PHP
Python
Ruby
Scala

Java
PHP
Python

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

Java
Python
R
Scala

Groovy
Java

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

well-defined plugin interfaces; JavaScript server-side extensibility

yes

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

Triggers

yes

publish/subscribe channels provide some trigger functionality; RedisGears

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

none

Sharding

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

yes, utilizing Spark Core

none

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

Multi-source replication

none

Multi-source replication

with Redis Enterprise Pack
Source-replica replication

Chained replication is supported

none

MapReduce

Offers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methods

through RedisGears

Consistency concepts

Methods to ensure consistency in a distributed system

Immediate Consistency, Eventual consistency (configurable in cluster mode per master or individual client request)

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

none

Foreign keys

Referential integrity

yes

Constraint checking

yes

Relationships in graphs

Transaction concepts

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

ACID

Isolation support depends on the API used

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

yes

Durability

Support for making data persistent

yes

in-memory storage is supported as well

yes

Configurable mechanisms for persistency via snapshots and/or operations logs

yes

optional

In-memory capabilities

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

yes

User concepts

Access control

Default Basic authentication through RDF4J client, or via Java when run with cURL, default token-based in the Workbench or via Rest API, optional access through OpenID or Kerberos single sign-on.

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

Ontotext GraphDB is a semantic database engine that allows organizations to build...
» more

Competitive advantages

GraphDB allows you to link text and data in big knowledge graphs. It’s easy to experiment...
» more

Typical application scenarios

Metadata enrichment and management, linked data publishing, semantic inferencing...
» more

Key customers

GraphDB provides a platform for building next-generation AI and Knowledge Graph...
» more

Market metrics

GraphDB is the most utilized semantic triplestore for mission-critical enterprise...
» more

Licensing and pricing models

GraphDB Free is a non-commercial version and is free to use. GraphDB Enterprise edition...
» more

News

Migrating From LPG to RDF Graph Model
8 May 2024

Case study: Policy Enforcement Automation With Semantics
2 May 2024

Okay, RAG… We Have a Problem
26 April 2024

Scaling Understanding with the Help of Feedback Loops, Knowledge Graphs and NLP
19 April 2024

How Knowledge Graphs Power Data Mesh and Data Fabric
10 April 2024

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