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DBMS > IBM Db2 vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. Milvus vs. PostgreSQL

System Properties Comparison IBM Db2 vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. Milvus vs. PostgreSQL

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Editorial information provided by DB-Engines
NameIBM Db2 infoformerly named DB2 or IBM Database 2  Xexclude from comparisonMicrosoft SQL Server  Xexclude from comparisonMilvus  Xexclude from comparisonPostgreSQL  Xexclude from comparison
DescriptionCommon in IBM host environments, 2 different versions for host and Windows/LinuxMicrosofts 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 DBMS infoSince Version 10.5 support for JSON/BSON documents compatible with MongoDBRelational 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 modelsDocument store
RDF store infoin Db2 LUW (Linux, Unix, Windows)
Spatial DBMS infowith Db2 Spatial Extender
Document 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
Score128.46
Rank#8  Overall
#5  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.ibm.com/­products/­db2www.microsoft.com/­en-us/­sql-servermilvus.iowww.postgresql.org
Technical documentationwww.ibm.com/­docs/­en/­db2learn.microsoft.com/­en-US/­sql/­sql-servermilvus.io/­docs/­overview.mdwww.postgresql.org/­docs
DeveloperIBMMicrosoftPostgreSQL Global Development Group infowww.postgresql.org/­developer
Initial release1983 infohost version198920191989 info1989: Postgres, 1996: PostgreSQL
Current release12.1, October 2016SQL Server 2022, November 20222.3.4, January 202416.2, February 2024
License infoCommercial or Open Sourcecommercial infofree version is availablecommercial 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.
Zilliz Cloud – Cloud-native service for MilvusAiven for PostgreSQL: Fully managed PostgreSQL for developers with 70+ extensions and flexible orchestration tools.
Implementation languageC and C++C++C++, GoC
Server operating systemsAIX
HP-UX
Linux
Solaris
Windows
z/OS
Linux
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.yesnoyes infospecific XML-type available, but no XML query functionality.
Secondary indexesyesyesnoyes
SQL infoSupport of SQLyesyesnoyes infostandard with numerous extensions
APIs and other access methodsADO.NET
JDBC
JSON style queries infoMongoDB compatible
ODBC
XQuery
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 languagesC
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
C++
Go
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
Python
.Net
C
C++
Delphi
Java infoJDBC
JavaScript (Node.js)
Perl
PHP
Python
Tcl
Server-side scripts infoStored proceduresyesTransact 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 nodesSharding infoonly with Windows/Unix/Linux Versiontables 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 nodesyes infowith separate tools (MQ, InfoSphere)yes, 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 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 datayesyesyesyes
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.yesyesno
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
IBM Db2 infoformerly named DB2 or IBM Database 2Microsoft 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...
» more
Typical application scenariosRAG: retrieval augmented generation Video media : video understanding, video deduplication....
» more
Key customersMilvus is trusted by thousands of enterprises, including PayPal, eBay, IKEA, LINE,...
» more
Market metricsAs of January 2024, 25k+ GitHub stars 10M+ downloads and installations​ ​ 3k+ enterprise...
» more
Licensing and pricing modelsMilvus was released under the open-source Apache License 2.0 in October 2019. Fully-managed...
» more

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More resources
IBM Db2 infoformerly named DB2 or IBM Database 2Microsoft SQL ServerMilvusPostgreSQL
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