DBMS > Informix vs. PostgreSQL

System Properties Comparison Informix vs. PostgreSQL

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Our visitors often compare Informix and PostgreSQL with IBM Db2, Microsoft SQL Server and MySQL.

Editorial information provided by DB-Engines

Name

Description

A secure embeddable database from IBM, positioned besides IBM Db2 as a relatively low-cost product optimized for OLTP and Internet of Things data

Widely used open source RDBMS

Developed as objectoriented DBMS (Postgres), gradually enhanced with 'standards' like SQL

Primary database model

Relational DBMS

Since Version 12.10 support for JSON/BSON datatypes compatible with MongoDB

Relational DBMS

with object oriented extensions, e.g.: user defined types/functions and inheritance. Handling of key/value pairs with hstore module.

Secondary database models

Document store
Spatial DBMS
Time Series DBMS

with Informix TimeSeries Extension

Document store
Graph DBMS

with Apache Age
Spatial DBMS

DB-Engines Ranking measures the popularity of database management systems
Trend Chart

Score	22.48
Rank	#33	Overall
	#20	Relational DBMS

Score	612.82
Rank	#4	Overall
	#4	Relational DBMS

Website

www.ibm.com/products/informix

www.postgresql.org

Technical documentation

informix.hcldoc.com
www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SSGU8G/welcomeIfxServers.html

www.postgresql.org/docs

Developer

IBM, HCL Technologies

Effective May 1st, 2017, HCL took on development, technical support, and product management teams, and works jointly with IBM on product strategy, marketing, and sales.

PostgreSQL Global Development Group

www.postgresql.org/developer

Initial release

1984

1989

1989: Postgres, 1996: PostgreSQL

Current release

14.10.FC5, November 2020

15.3, May 2023

License

Commercial or Open Source

commercial

free developer edition available

Open Source

BSD

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.

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Implementation language

C, C++ and Java

Server operating systems

AIX
HP-UX
Linux
macOS
Solaris
Windows

FreeBSD
HP-UX
Linux
NetBSD
OpenBSD
OS X
Solaris
Unix
Windows

Data scheme

yes

Typing

predefined data types such as float or date

yes

Since Version 12.10 support for JSON/BSON datatypes

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.

yes

specific XML-type available, but no XML query functionality.

Secondary indexes

yes

SQL

Support of SQL

yes

standard with numerous extensions

APIs and other access methods

JDBC
JSON API

MongoDB compatible
MQTT (Message Queue Telemetry Transport)
ODBC
RESTful HTTP API

ADO.NET
JDBC
native C library
ODBC
streaming API for large objects

Supported programming languages

.Net
C
C++
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
PHP
Python
Ruby

.Net
C
C++
Delphi
Java

JDBC
JavaScript (Node.js)
Perl
PHP
Python
Tcl

Server-side scripts

Stored procedures

yes

user defined functions

realized in proprietary language PL/pgSQL or with common languages like Perl, Python, Tcl etc.

Triggers

yes

Partitioning methods

Methods for storing different data on different nodes

Sharding

partitioning by range, list and (since PostgreSQL 11) by hash

Replication methods

Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes

Multi-source replication
Source-replica replication

Source-replica replication

other methods possible by using 3rd party extensions

MapReduce

Offers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methods

Consistency concepts

Methods to ensure consistency in a distributed system

Immediate Consistency

Foreign keys

Referential integrity

yes

Transaction concepts

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

ACID

Concurrency

Support for concurrent manipulation of data

yes

Durability

Support for making data persistent

yes

In-memory capabilities

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

yes

User concepts

Access control

Users with fine-grained authentication, authorization, and auditing controls

fine grained access rights according to SQL-standard

More information provided by the system vendor

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Related products and services

3rd parties

pgDash: In-Depth PostgreSQL Monitoring.
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Aiven for PostgreSQL: The familiar open source PostgreSQL® that you know and love, with no proprietary features or add-ons that will lock you in.
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The State of PostgreSQL 2022 survey is now open!
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Fujitsu Enterprise Postgres: An Enterprise Grade PostgreSQL with the flexibility of a hybrid cloud solution combined with industry leading security, availability and performance.
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Datasentinel: Platform for Monitoring and Analyzing the performance problems of your PostgreSQL Clusters
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DbVisualizer is equipping database professionals with the tools they need to build, manage and maintain state-of-the-art database technologies. It has sky-high user satisfaction and is the preferred tool for database professionals around the world. Customers include Tesla, Apple, Facebook, Deutsche Bank, NASA, and 25,000 others in 145 countries.
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SQLFlow: Provides a visual representation of the overall flow of data. Automated SQL data lineage analysis across Databases, ETL, Business Intelligence, Cloud and Hadoop environments by parsing SQL Script and stored procedure.
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Navicat for PostgreSQL is an easy-to-use graphical tool for PostgreSQL database development.
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Instaclustr: Fully Hosted & Managed PostgreSQL
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We invite representatives of vendors of related products to contact us for presenting information about their offerings here.

More resources

DB-Engines blog posts

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3 January 2022, Paul Andlinger, Matthias Gelbmann

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15 November 2021, Umair Shahid, Percona (sponsor)

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