DBMS > Neo4j vs. PostgreSQL vs. Redis vs. ScyllaDB vs. SwayDB
System Properties Comparison Neo4j vs. PostgreSQL vs. Redis vs. ScyllaDB vs. SwayDB
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| Name | Neo4j Xexclude from comparison | PostgreSQL Xexclude from comparison | Redis Xexclude from comparison | ScyllaDB Xexclude from comparison | SwayDB Xexclude from comparison | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Description | Scalable, ACID-compliant graph database designed with a high-performance distributed cluster architecture, available in self-hosted and cloud offerings | Widely used open source RDBMS  Developed as objectoriented DBMS (Postgres), gradually enhanced with 'standards' like SQL | Popular in-memory data platform used as a cache, message broker, and database that can be deployed on-premises, across clouds, and hybrid environments Redis focuses on performance so most of its design decisions prioritize high performance and very low latencies. | Cassandra and DynamoDB compatible wide column store | An embeddable, non-blocking, type-safe key-value store for single or multiple disks and in-memory storage | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Primary database model | Graph DBMS | Relational DBMS with object oriented extensions, e.g.: user defined types/functions and inheritance. Handling of key/value pairs with hstore module. | Key-value store Multiple data types and a rich set of operations, as well as configurable data expiration, eviction and persistence | Wide column store | Key-value store | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Secondary database models | Document store Graph DBMS with Apache AgeSpatial DBMS Vector DBMS with pgvector extension | Document store with RedisJSON Graph DBMS with RedisGraphSpatial DBMS Search engine with RediSearchTime Series DBMS with RedisTimeSeriesVector DBMS | Key-value store | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Website | neo4j.com | www.postgresql.org | redis.com redis.io | www.scylladb.com | swaydb.simer.au | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Technical documentation | neo4j.com/docs | www.postgresql.org/docs | docs.redis.com/latest/index.html redis.io/docs | docs.scylladb.com | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Developer | Neo4j, Inc. | PostgreSQL Global Development Group www.postgresql.org/developer | Redis project core team, inspired by Salvatore Sanfilippo Development sponsored by Redis Inc. | ScyllaDB | Simer Plaha | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Initial release | 2007 | 1989 1989: Postgres, 1996: PostgreSQL | 2009 | 2015 | 2018 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Current release | 5.20, May 2024 | 16.3, May 2024 | 7.2.5, May 2024 | ScyllaDB Open Source 5.4.1, January 2024 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| License Commercial or Open Source | Open Source GPL version3, commercial licenses available | Open Source BSD | Open Source source-available extensions (modules), commercial licenses for Redis Enterprise | Open Source Open Source (AGPL), commercial license available | Open Source GNU Affero GPL V3.0 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Cloud-based only Only available as a cloud service | no | no | no | no | no | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| DBaaS offerings (sponsored links) Database as a Service Providers of DBaaS offerings, please contact us to be listed. | Neo4j Aura: Neo4j’s fully managed cloud service: The zero-admin, always-on graph database for cloud developers. |
| Aiven for Redis: Fully managed in-memory key-value store for all your caching and speedy lookup needs. | Scylla Cloud: Create real-time applications that run at global scale with Scylla Cloud, the industry’s most powerful NoSQL DBaaS | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Implementation language | Java, Scala | C | C | C++ | Scala | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Server operating systems | Linux Can also be used server-less as embedded Java database. OS X Solaris Windows | FreeBSD HP-UX Linux NetBSD OpenBSD OS X Solaris Unix Windows | BSD Linux OS X Windows ported and maintained by Microsoft Open Technologies, Inc. | Linux | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Data scheme | schema-free and schema-optional | yes | schema-free | schema-free | schema-free | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Typing predefined data types such as float or date | yes | yes | partial Supported data types are strings, hashes, lists, sets and sorted sets, bit arrays, hyperloglogs and geospatial indexes | yes | no | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 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. | no | no | no | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Secondary indexes | yes pluggable indexing subsystem, by default Apache Lucene | yes | yes with RediSearch module | yes cluster global secondary indices | no | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| SQL Support of SQL | no | yes standard with numerous extensions | with RediSQL module | SQL-like DML and DDL statements (CQL) | no | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| APIs and other access methods | Bolt protocol Cypher query language Java API Neo4j-OGM Object Graph MapperRESTful HTTP API Spring Data Neo4j TinkerPop 3 | ADO.NET JDBC native C library ODBC streaming API for large objects | proprietary protocol RESP - REdis Serialization Protocol | Proprietary protocol (CQL) compatible with CQL (Cassandra Query Language, an SQL-like language) RESTful HTTP API (DynamoDB compatible) Thrift | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Supported programming languages | .Net Clojure Elixir Go Groovy Haskell Java JavaScript Perl PHP Python Ruby Scala | .Net C C++ Delphi Java JDBCJavaScript (Node.js) Perl PHP Python Tcl | C C# C++ Clojure Crystal D Dart Elixir Erlang Fancy Go Haskell Haxe Java JavaScript (Node.js) Lisp Lua MatLab Objective-C OCaml Pascal Perl PHP Prolog Pure Data Python R Rebol Ruby Rust Scala Scheme Smalltalk Swift Tcl Visual Basic | For CQL interface: C#, C++, Clojure, Erlang, Go, Haskell, Java, JavaScript, Node.js, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby, Rust, Scala For DynamoDB interface: .Net, ColdFusion, Erlang, Groovy, Java, JavaScript, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby | Java Kotlin Scala | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Server-side scripts Stored procedures | yes User defined Procedures and Functions | user defined functions realized in proprietary language PL/pgSQL or with common languages like Perl, Python, Tcl etc. | Lua; Redis Functions coming in Redis 7 (slides and Github) | yes, Lua | no | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Triggers | yes via event handler | yes | publish/subscribe channels provide some trigger functionality; RedisGears | no | no | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Partitioning methods Methods for storing different data on different nodes | yes using Neo4j Fabric | partitioning by range, list and (since PostgreSQL 11) by hash | Sharding Automatic hash-based sharding with support for hash-tags for manual sharding | Sharding | none | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Replication methods Methods for redundantly storing data on multiple nodes | Causal Clustering using Raft protocol available in in Enterprise Version only | Source-replica replication other methods possible by using 3rd party extensions | Multi-source replication with Redis Enterprise Pack Source-replica replication Chained replication is supported | selectable replication factor Representation of geographical distribution of servers is possible | none | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| MapReduce Offers an API for user-defined Map/Reduce methods | no | no | through RedisGears | no | no | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Consistency concepts Methods to ensure consistency in a distributed system | Causal and Eventual Consistency configurable in Causal Cluster setup Immediate Consistency in stand-alone mode | Immediate Consistency | Eventual Consistency Causal consistency can be enabled in Active-Active databases Strong consistency with Redis Raft Strong eventual consistency with Active-Active | Eventual Consistency Tunable Consistency can be individually decided for each write operation | Immediate Consistency | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Foreign keys Referential integrity | yes Relationships in graphs | yes | no | no | no | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Transaction concepts Support to ensure data integrity after non-atomic manipulations of data | ACID | ACID | Atomic execution of command blocks and scripts and optimistic locking | no Atomicity and isolation are supported for single operations | Atomic execution of operations | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Concurrency Support for concurrent manipulation of data | yes | yes | yes Data access is serialized by the server | yes | yes | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Durability Support for making data persistent | yes | yes | yes Configurable mechanisms for persistency via snapshots and/or operations logs | yes | yes | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| In-memory capabilities Is there an option to define some or all structures to be held in-memory only. | no | yes | yes in-memory tables | yes | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| User concepts Access control | Users, roles and permissions. Pluggable authentication with supported standards (LDAP, Active Directory, Kerberos) | fine grained access rights according to SQL-standard | Access Control Lists (ACLs): redis.io/docs/management/security/acl LDAP and Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) for Redis Enterprise Mutual TLS authentication: redis.io/docs/management/security/encryption Password-based authentication | Access rights for users can be defined per object | no | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| More information provided by the system vendor | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Neo4j | PostgreSQL | Redis | ScyllaDB | SwayDB | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Specific characteristics | Neo4j delivers graph technology that has been battle tested for performance and scale... » more | ScyllaDB is engineered to deliver predictable performance at scale. It’s adopted... » more | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Competitive advantages | Neo4j is the market leader, graph database category creator, and the most widely... » more | Highly-performant (efficiently utilizes full resources of a node and network; millions... » more | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Typical application scenarios | Real-Time Recommendations Master Data Management Identity and Access Management Network... » more | ScyllaDB is ideal for applications that require high throughput and low latency at... » more | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Key customers | Over 800 commercial customers and over 4300 startups use Neo4j. Flagship customers... » more | Discord, Epic Games, Expedia, Zillow, Comcast, Disney+ Hotstar, Samsung, ShareChat,... » more | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Market metrics | Neo4j boasts the world's largest graph database ecosystem with more than 140 million... » more | ScyllaDB typically offers ~75% total cost of ownership savings, with ~5X higher throughput... » more | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Licensing and pricing models | GPL v3 license that can be used all the places where you might use MySQL. Neo4j Commercial... » more | ScyllaDB Open Source - free open source software (AGPL) ScyllaDB Enterprise - subscription-based... » more | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| News | openCypher Will Pave the Road to GQL for Cypher Implementers 7 Tips for Submitting Your NODES 2024 Talk How to Configure Neo4j Aura With AWS PrivateLink This Week in Neo4j: Podcast, GraphRAG, GraphQL, Chatbot and more Neo4j Joins the Connect with Confluent Partner Program | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Neo4j | PostgreSQL | Redis | ScyllaDB | SwayDB | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| DB-Engines blog posts | Applying Graph Analytics to Game of Thrones MySQL, PostgreSQL and Redis are the winners of the March ranking The openCypher Project: Help Shape the SQL for Graphs | PostgreSQL is the DBMS of the Year 2023 Snowflake is the DBMS of the Year 2022, defending the title from last year Snowflake is the DBMS of the Year 2021 | PostgreSQL is the DBMS of the Year 2018 MySQL, PostgreSQL and Redis are the winners of the March ranking MongoDB is the DBMS of the year, defending the title from last year | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Recent citations in the news | Neo Technology Announces Neo4j GraphDays Events in Seattle and Silicon Valley Neo4j Announces Collaboration with Microsoft to Advance GenAI and Data Solutions USA - English - India - English Neo4j CTO says new Graph Query Language standard will have 'massive ripple effects' Using Neo4j’s graph database for AI in Azure Neo4j Is Planning IPO on Nasdaq, Largest Owner Greenbridge Says provided by Google News | How to implement a better like, views, comment counters in PostgreSQL? Automatically Generate Types for Your PostgreSQL Database First Principles: Optimizing PostgreSQL for the cloud Oracle Introduces PostgreSQL Running Native on OCI General availability: Microsoft Entra ID integration with Azure Cosmos DB for PostgreSQL | Azure updates provided by Google News | Redis acquires storage engine startup Speedb to enhance its open-source database Redis expands data management capabilities with Speedb acquisition – Blocks and Files In-memory database Redis wants to dabble in disk AWS announces vector search for Amazon MemoryDB for Redis (Preview) Linux Foundation Backs 'Valkey' Open-Source Fork of Redis provided by Google News | ScyllaDB Raises $43M to Take on MongoDB at Scale, Push Database Performance to New Levels Sleeping at Scale - Delivering 10k Timers per Second per Node with Rust, Tokio, Kafka, and Scylla Running ScyllaDB NoSQL on Kubernetes with Spot Instances ScyllaDB on AWS is a NoSQL Database Built for Gigabyte-to-Petabyte Scale | Amazon Web Services ScyllaDB Launches Scylla Cloud Database as a Service provided by Google News | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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