DBMS > H2 vs. IBM Db2 vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. Realm vs. Redis

System Properties Comparison H2 vs. IBM Db2 vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. Realm vs. Redis

Editorial information provided by DB-Engines

Name

Description

Full-featured RDBMS with a small footprint, either embedded into a Java application or used as a database server.

Common in IBM host environments, 2 different versions for host and Windows/Linux

Microsofts flagship relational DBMS

A DBMS built for use on mobile devices that’s a fast, easy to use alternative to SQLite and Core 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

Relational DBMS

Since Version 10.5 support for JSON/BSON documents compatible with MongoDB

Relational DBMS

Document store

Key-value store

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

Secondary database models

Spatial DBMS

Document store
RDF store

in Db2 LUW (Linux, Unix, Windows)
Spatial DBMS

with Db2 Spatial Extender

Document store
Graph DBMS
Spatial 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	8.22
Rank	#50	Overall
	#32	Relational DBMS

Score	127.49
Rank	#8	Overall
	#5	Relational DBMS

Score	829.80
Rank	#3	Overall
	#3	Relational DBMS

Score	7.71
Rank	#52	Overall
	#9	Document stores

Score	156.44
Rank	#6	Overall
	#1	Key-value stores

Website

www.h2database.com

www.ibm.com/products/db2

www.microsoft.com/en-us/sql-server

realm.io

redis.com
redis.io

Technical documentation

www.h2database.com/html/main.html

www.ibm.com/docs/en/db2

learn.microsoft.com/en-US/sql/sql-server

realm.io/docs

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

Developer

Thomas Mueller

IBM

Microsoft

Realm, acquired by MongoDB in May 2019

Redis project core team, inspired by Salvatore Sanfilippo

Development sponsored by Redis Inc.

Initial release

2005

1983

host version

1989

2014

2009

Current release

2.2.220, July 2023

12.1, October 2016

SQL Server 2022, November 2022

7.2.4, January 2024

License

Commercial or Open Source

Open Source

dual-licence (Mozilla public license, Eclipse public license)

commercial

free version is available

commercial

restricted free version is available

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.

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

Implementation language

Java

C and C++

C++

Server operating systems

All OS with a Java VM

AIX
HP-UX
Linux
Solaris
Windows
z/OS

Linux
Windows

Android
Backend: server-less
iOS
Windows

BSD
Linux
OS X
Windows

ported and maintained by Microsoft Open Technologies, Inc.

Data scheme

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

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

with RediSearch module

SQL

Support of SQL

yes

with RediSQL module

APIs and other access methods

JDBC
ODBC

ADO.NET
JDBC
JSON style queries

MongoDB compatible
ODBC
XQuery

ADO.NET
JDBC
ODBC
OLE DB
Tabular Data Stream (TDS)

proprietary protocol

RESP - REdis Serialization Protocol

Supported programming languages

Java

C
C#
C++
Cobol
Delphi
Fortran
Java
Perl
PHP
Python
Ruby
Visual Basic

C#
C++
Delphi
Go
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
PHP
Python
R
Ruby
Visual Basic

.Net
Java

with Android only
Objective-C
React Native
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

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

Java Stored Procedures and User-Defined Functions

yes

Transact SQL, .NET languages, R, Python and (with SQL Server 2019) Java

runs within the applications so server-side scripts are unnecessary

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

Triggers

yes

Change Listeners

publish/subscribe channels provide some trigger functionality; RedisGears

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

none

Sharding

only with Windows/Unix/Linux Version

tables can be distributed across several files (horizontal partitioning); sharding through federation

none

Sharding

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

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

With clustering: 2 database servers on different computers operate on identical copies of a database

yes

with separate tools (MQ, InfoSphere)

yes, but depending on the SQL-Server Edition

none

Multi-source replication

with Redis Enterprise Pack
Source-replica replication

Chained replication is supported

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
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

Transaction concepts

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

ACID

Atomic execution of command blocks and scripts and optimistic locking

Concurrency

Support for concurrent manipulation of data

yes, multi-version concurrency control (MVCC)

yes

Data access is serialized by the server

Durability

Support for making data persistent

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

In-Memory realm

yes

User concepts

Access control

fine grained access rights according to SQL-standard

yes

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

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