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DBMS > Microsoft Access vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. PostgreSQL

System Properties Comparison Microsoft Access vs. Microsoft SQL Server vs. PostgreSQL

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NameMicrosoft Access  Xexclude from comparisonMicrosoft SQL Server  Xexclude from comparisonPostgreSQL  Xexclude from comparison
DescriptionMicrosoft Access combines a backend RDBMS (JET / ACE Engine) with a GUI frontend for data manipulation and queries. infoThe Access frontend is often used for accessing other datasources (DBMS, Excel, etc.)Microsofts flagship relational DBMSWidely used open source RDBMS infoDeveloped as objectoriented DBMS (Postgres), gradually enhanced with 'standards' like SQL
Primary database modelRelational DBMSRelational 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
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
Score95.91
Rank#13  Overall
#9  Relational DBMS
Score774.89
Rank#3  Overall
#3  Relational DBMS
Score674.32
Rank#4  Overall
#4  Relational DBMS
Websitewww.microsoft.com/­en-us/­microsoft-365/­accesswww.microsoft.com/­en-us/­sql-serverwww.postgresql.org
Technical documentationdeveloper.microsoft.com/­en-us/­accesslearn.microsoft.com/­en-US/­sql/­sql-serverwww.postgresql.org/­docs
DeveloperMicrosoftMicrosoftPostgreSQL Global Development Group infowww.postgresql.org/­developer
Initial release199219891989 info1989: Postgres, 1996: PostgreSQL
Current release1902 (16.0.11328.20222), March 2019SQL Server 2022, November 202216.4, August 2024
License infoCommercial or Open Sourcecommercial infoBundled with Microsoft Officecommercial inforestricted free version is availableOpen Source infoBSD
Cloud-based only infoOnly available as a cloud servicenonono
DBaaS offerings (sponsored links) infoDatabase as a Service

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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.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.
Implementation languageC++C++C
Server operating systemsWindows infoNot a real database server, but making use of DLLsLinux
Windows
FreeBSD
HP-UX
Linux
NetBSD
OpenBSD
OS X
Solaris
Unix
Windows
Data schemeyesyesyes
Typing infopredefined data types such as float or dateyesyesyes
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.yesyes infospecific XML-type available, but no XML query functionality.
Secondary indexesyesyesyes
SQL infoSupport of SQLyes infobut not compliant to any SQL standardyesyes infostandard with numerous extensions
APIs and other access methodsADO.NET
DAO
ODBC
OLE DB
ADO.NET
JDBC
ODBC
OLE DB
Tabular Data Stream (TDS)
ADO.NET
JDBC
native C library
ODBC
streaming API for large objects
Supported programming languagesC
C#
C++
Delphi
Java (JDBC-ODBC)
VBA
Visual Basic.NET
C#
C++
Delphi
Go
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
PHP
Python
R
Ruby
Visual Basic
.Net
C
C++
Delphi
Java infoJDBC
JavaScript (Node.js)
Perl
PHP
Python
Tcl
Server-side scripts infoStored proceduresyes infosince Access 2010 using the ACE-engineTransact SQL, .NET languages, R, Python and (with SQL Server 2019) Javauser defined functions inforealized in proprietary language PL/pgSQL or with common languages like Perl, Python, Tcl etc.
Triggersyes infosince Access 2010 using the ACE-engineyesyes
Partitioning methods infoMethods for storing different data on different nodesnonetables can be distributed across several files (horizontal partitioning); sharding through federationpartitioning by range, list and (since PostgreSQL 11) by hash
Replication methods infoMethods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodesnoneyes, 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 methodsnonono
Consistency concepts infoMethods to ensure consistency in a distributed systemImmediate ConsistencyImmediate Consistency
Foreign keys infoReferential integrityyesyesyes
Transaction concepts infoSupport to ensure data integrity after non-atomic manipulations of dataACID infobut no files for transaction loggingACIDACID
Concurrency infoSupport for concurrent manipulation of datayesyesyes
Durability infoSupport for making data persistentyes infobut no files for transaction loggingyesyes
In-memory capabilities infoIs there an option to define some or all structures to be held in-memory only.yesno
User concepts infoAccess controlno infoa simple user-level security was built in till version Access 2003fine grained access rights according to SQL-standardfine grained access rights according to SQL-standard

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Microsoft AccessMicrosoft SQL ServerPostgreSQL
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