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DBMS > Microsoft SQL Server vs. Neo4j vs. Snowflake

System Properties Comparison Microsoft SQL Server vs. Neo4j vs. Snowflake

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Editorial information provided by DB-Engines
NameMicrosoft SQL Server  Xexclude from comparisonNeo4j  Xexclude from comparisonSnowflake  Xexclude from comparison
DescriptionMicrosofts flagship relational DBMSScalable, ACID-compliant graph database designed with a high-performance distributed cluster architecture, available in self-hosted and cloud offeringsCloud-based data warehousing service for structured and semi-structured data
Primary database modelRelational DBMSGraph DBMSRelational DBMS
Secondary database modelsDocument store
Graph DBMS
Spatial DBMS
DB-Engines Ranking infomeasures the popularity of database management systemsranking trend
Trend Chart
Score786.87
Rank#3  Overall
#3  Relational DBMS
Score45.34
Rank#20  Overall
#1  Graph DBMS
Score155.58
Rank#7  Overall
#5  Relational DBMS
Websitewww.microsoft.com/­en-us/­sql-serverneo4j.comwww.snowflake.com
Technical documentationlearn.microsoft.com/­en-US/­sql/­sql-serverneo4j.com/­docsdocs.snowflake.net/­manuals/­index.html
DeveloperMicrosoftNeo4j, Inc.Snowflake Computing Inc.
Initial release198920072014
Current releaseSQL Server 2022, November 20225.23, August 2024
License infoCommercial or Open Sourcecommercial inforestricted free version is availableOpen Source infoGPL version3, commercial licenses availablecommercial
Cloud-based only infoOnly available as a cloud servicenonoyes
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.
Implementation languageC++Java, Scala
Server operating systemsLinux
Windows
Linux infoCan also be used server-less as embedded Java database.
OS X
Solaris
Windows
hosted
Data schemeyesschema-free and schema-optionalyes infosupport of semi-structured data formats (JSON, XML, Avro)
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
Secondary indexesyesyes infopluggable indexing subsystem, by default Apache Lucene
SQL infoSupport of SQLyesnoyes
APIs and other access methodsADO.NET
JDBC
ODBC
OLE DB
Tabular Data Stream (TDS)
Bolt protocol
Cypher query language
Java API
Neo4j-OGM infoObject Graph Mapper
RESTful HTTP API
Spring Data Neo4j
TinkerPop 3
CLI Client
JDBC
ODBC
Supported programming languagesC#
C++
Delphi
Go
Java
JavaScript (Node.js)
PHP
Python
R
Ruby
Visual Basic
.Net
Clojure
Elixir
Go
Groovy
Haskell
Java
JavaScript
Perl
PHP
Python
Ruby
Scala
JavaScript (Node.js)
Python
Server-side scripts infoStored proceduresTransact SQL, .NET languages, R, Python and (with SQL Server 2019) Javayes infoUser defined Procedures and Functionsuser defined functions
Triggersyesyes infovia event handlerno infosimilar concept for controling cloud resources
Partitioning methods infoMethods for storing different data on different nodestables can be distributed across several files (horizontal partitioning); sharding through federationyes using Neo4j Fabricyes
Replication methods infoMethods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodesyes, but depending on the SQL-Server EditionCausal Clustering using Raft protocol infoavailable in in Enterprise Version onlyyes
MapReduce infoOffers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methodsnonono
Consistency concepts infoMethods to ensure consistency in a distributed systemImmediate ConsistencyCausal and Eventual Consistency configurable in Causal Cluster setup
Immediate Consistency in stand-alone mode
Immediate Consistency
Foreign keys infoReferential integrityyesyes infoRelationships in graphsyes
Transaction concepts infoSupport to ensure data integrity after non-atomic manipulations of dataACIDACIDACID
Concurrency infoSupport for concurrent manipulation of datayesyesyes
Durability infoSupport for making data persistentyesyesyes
In-memory capabilities infoIs there an option to define some or all structures to be held in-memory only.yesno
User concepts infoAccess controlfine grained access rights according to SQL-standardUsers, roles and permissions. Pluggable authentication with supported standards (LDAP, Active Directory, Kerberos)Users with fine-grained authorization concept, user roles and pluggable authentication
More information provided by the system vendor
Microsoft SQL ServerNeo4jSnowflake
Specific characteristicsNeo4j delivers graph technology that has been battle tested for performance and scale...
» more
Competitive advantagesNeo4j is the market leader, graph database category creator, and the most widely...
» more
Typical application scenariosReal-Time Recommendations Master Data Management Identity and Access Management Network...
» more
Key customersOver 800 commercial customers and over 4300 startups use Neo4j. Flagship customers...
» more
Market metricsNeo4j boasts the world's largest graph database ecosystem with more than 140 million...
» more
Licensing and pricing modelsGPL v3 license that can be used all the places where you might use MySQL. Neo4j Commercial...
» more
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15 January 2025

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and for displaying vendor-provided information such as key customers, competitive advantages and market metrics.

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Microsoft SQL ServerNeo4jSnowflake
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