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DBMS > H2 vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. Milvus vs. PostgreSQL

System Properties Comparison H2 vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. Milvus vs. PostgreSQL

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Editorial information provided by DB-Engines
NameH2  Xexclude from comparisonMicrosoft SQL Server  Xexclude from comparisonMilvus  Xexclude from comparisonPostgreSQL  Xexclude from comparison
DescriptionFull-featured RDBMS with a small footprint, either embedded into a Java application or used as a database server.Microsofts flagship relational DBMSA DBMS designed for efficient storage of vector data and vector similarity searchesWidely used open source RDBMS infoDeveloped as objectoriented DBMS (Postgres), gradually enhanced with 'standards' like SQL
Primary database modelRelational DBMSRelational DBMSVector DBMSRelational DBMS infowith object oriented extensions, e.g.: user defined types/functions and inheritance. Handling of key/value pairs with hstore module.
Secondary database modelsSpatial DBMSDocument 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
Score8.13
Rank#49  Overall
#31  Relational DBMS
Score824.29
Rank#3  Overall
#3  Relational DBMS
Score2.31
Rank#113  Overall
#3  Vector DBMS
Score645.54
Rank#4  Overall
#4  Relational DBMS
Websitewww.h2database.comwww.microsoft.com/­en-us/­sql-servermilvus.iowww.postgresql.org
Technical documentationwww.h2database.com/­html/­main.htmllearn.microsoft.com/­en-US/­sql/­sql-servermilvus.io/­docs/­overview.mdwww.postgresql.org/­docs
DeveloperThomas MuellerMicrosoftPostgreSQL Global Development Group infowww.postgresql.org/­developer
Initial release2005198920191989 info1989: Postgres, 1996: PostgreSQL
Current release2.2.220, July 2023SQL Server 2022, November 20222.3.4, January 202416.3, May 2024
License infoCommercial or Open SourceOpen Source infodual-licence (Mozilla public license, Eclipse public license)commercial inforestricted free version is availableOpen Source infoApache Version 2.0Open Source infoBSD
Cloud-based only infoOnly available as a cloud servicenononono
DBaaS offerings (sponsored links) infoDatabase as a Service

Providers of DBaaS offerings, please contact us to be listed.
SQLServer Flex @ STACKIT offers a managed version of SQL Server with adjustable CPU, RAM, storage amount and speed, in enterprise grade to perfectly match all application requirements. All services are 100% GDPR-compliant.Zilliz Cloud – Cloud-native service for Milvus
  • PostgreSQL Flex @ STACKIT offers managed PostgreSQL Instances with adjustable CPU, RAM, storage amount and speed and several extensions available, in enterprise grade to perfectly match all application requirements. All 100% GDPR-compliant.
  • Aiven for PostgreSQL: Fully managed PostgreSQL for developers with 70+ extensions and flexible orchestration tools.
Implementation languageJavaC++C++, GoC
Server operating systemsAll OS with a Java VMLinux
Windows
Linux
macOS info10.14 or later
Windows infowith WSL 2 enabled
FreeBSD
HP-UX
Linux
NetBSD
OpenBSD
OS X
Solaris
Unix
Windows
Data schemeyesyesyes
Typing infopredefined data types such as float or dateyesyesVector, Numeric and Stringyes
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.noyesnoyes infospecific XML-type available, but no XML query functionality.
Secondary indexesyesyesnoyes
SQL infoSupport of SQLyesyesnoyes infostandard with numerous extensions
APIs and other access methodsJDBC
ODBC
ADO.NET
JDBC
ODBC
OLE DB
Tabular Data Stream (TDS)
RESTful HTTP APIADO.NET
JDBC
native C library
ODBC
streaming API for large objects
Supported programming languagesJavaC#
C++
Delphi
Go
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
PHP
Python
R
Ruby
Visual Basic
C++
Go
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
Python
.Net
C
C++
Delphi
Java infoJDBC
JavaScript (Node.js)
Perl
PHP
Python
Tcl
Server-side scripts infoStored proceduresJava Stored Procedures and User-Defined FunctionsTransact SQL, .NET languages, R, Python and (with SQL Server 2019) Javanouser defined functions inforealized in proprietary language PL/pgSQL or with common languages like Perl, Python, Tcl etc.
Triggersyesyesnoyes
Partitioning methods infoMethods for storing different data on different nodesnonetables can be distributed across several files (horizontal partitioning); sharding through federationShardingpartitioning by range, list and (since PostgreSQL 11) by hash
Replication methods infoMethods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodesWith clustering: 2 database servers on different computers operate on identical copies of a databaseyes, 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 methodsnononono
Consistency concepts infoMethods to ensure consistency in a distributed systemImmediate ConsistencyImmediate ConsistencyBounded Staleness
Eventual Consistency
Immediate Consistency
Session Consistency
Tunable Consistency
Immediate Consistency
Foreign keys infoReferential integrityyesyesnoyes
Transaction concepts infoSupport to ensure data integrity after non-atomic manipulations of dataACIDACIDnoACID
Concurrency infoSupport for concurrent manipulation of datayes, multi-version concurrency control (MVCC)yesyesyes
Durability infoSupport for making data persistentyesyesyesyes
In-memory capabilities infoIs there an option to define some or all structures to be held in-memory only.yesyesyesno
User concepts infoAccess controlfine grained access rights according to SQL-standardfine grained access rights according to SQL-standardRole based access control and fine grained access rightsfine grained access rights according to SQL-standard
More information provided by the system vendor
H2Microsoft SQL ServerMilvusPostgreSQL
Specific characteristicsMilvus is an open-source and cloud-native vector database built for production-ready...
» more
Competitive advantagesHighly available, versatile, and robust with millisecond latency. Supports batch...
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Typical application scenariosRAG: retrieval augmented generation Video media : video understanding, video deduplication....
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Key customersMilvus is trusted by thousands of enterprises, including PayPal, eBay, IKEA, LINE,...
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Market metricsAs of January 2024, 25k+ GitHub stars 10M+ downloads and installations​ ​ 3k+ enterprise...
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Licensing and pricing modelsMilvus was released under the open-source Apache License 2.0 in October 2019. Fully-managed...
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H2Microsoft SQL ServerMilvusPostgreSQL
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