Amazon DynamoDB vs. PostgreSQL

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Amazon DynamoDB
Score 8.7 out of 10
N/A
Amazon DynamoDB is a cloud-native, NoSQL, serverless database service.
$0
capacity unit per hour
PostgreSQL
Score 8.5 out of 10
N/A
PostgreSQL (alternately Postgres) is a free and open source object-relational database system boasting over 30 years of active development, reliability, feature robustness, and performance. It supports SQL and is designed to support various workloads flexibly.N/A
Pricing
Amazon DynamoDBPostgreSQL
Editions & Modules
Provisioned - Read Operation
$0.00013
capacity unit per hour
Provisioned - Write Operation
$0.00065
capacity unit per hour
Provisioned - Global Tables
$0.000975
per Read Capacity
On-Demand Streams
$0.02
per 100,000 read operations
Provisioned - Streams
$0.02
per 100,000 read operations
On-Demand Data Requests Outside AWS Regions
$0.09
per GB
Provisioned - Data Requests Outside AWS Regions
$0.09
per GB
On-Demand Snapshot
$0.10
per GB per month
Provisioned - Snapshot
$0.10
per GB per month
On-Demand Restoring a Backup
$0.15
per GB
Provisioned - Restoring a Backup
$0.15
per GB
On-Demand Point-in-Time Recovery
$0.20
per GB per month
Provisioned - Point-in-Time Recovery
$0.20
per GB per month
On-Demand Read Operation
$0.25
per million requests
On-Demand Data Stored
$0.25
per GB per month
Provisioned - Data Stored
$0.25
per GB per month
On-Demand - Write Operation
$1.25
per million requests
On-Demand Global Tables
$1.875
per million write operations replicated
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Amazon DynamoDBPostgreSQL
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Amazon DynamoDBPostgreSQL
Considered Both Products
Amazon DynamoDB
Chose Amazon DynamoDB
While evaluating Cassandra, PostgreSQL, MongoDB and DynamoDB we found Cassandra and DynamoDB being well suited for us. At the same time we didn't have the luxury of large team or devops so it came down to Amazon DynamoDB. As a small team we are glad to go forward with this …
Chose Amazon DynamoDB
We ended up selecting DynamoDB compared to similar products simply because we host on AWS. To use any other NoSQL solution would require more work in the long run due to having to maintain the EC2 instance, manage updates to the operating system and whatever NoSQL system that …
Chose Amazon DynamoDB
Main advantage of DynamoDB is Amazon's offering as SaaS. This removes the need for managing the database. DynamoDB is well suited for querying simple and flat JSON objects.

Compared to PostgresSQL, I would pick Postgres over Dynamo considering that Postgres is very mature and …
Chose Amazon DynamoDB
Amazon DynamoDB is a strong contender for an enterprise NoSQL database. We chose Amazon DynamoDB due to:

  1. easy inclusion in our AWS architecture
PostgreSQL
Chose PostgreSQL
PostgreSQL provides both the traditional relational DB setup of MySQL and a more document-driven model like that of DynamoDB. As some of our data is relational and some is document-based, it was more efficient to select the tool that did both than run two, separate databases. …
Chose PostgreSQL
We selected PostgreSQL due to the number of employees who have used it in the past.
The data consistency guarantees.
The multiple transaction isolation levels support.
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
Amazon DynamoDBPostgreSQL
NoSQL Databases
Comparison of NoSQL Databases features of Product A and Product B
Amazon DynamoDB
9.5
27 Ratings
8% above category average
PostgreSQL
-
Ratings
Performance9.227 Ratings00 Ratings
Availability10.027 Ratings00 Ratings
Concurrency9.726 Ratings00 Ratings
Security9.727 Ratings00 Ratings
Scalability10.026 Ratings00 Ratings
Data model flexibility8.827 Ratings00 Ratings
Deployment model flexibility9.324 Ratings00 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Amazon DynamoDBPostgreSQL
Small Businesses
IBM Cloudant
IBM Cloudant
Score 9.3 out of 10
Redis™*
Redis™*
Score 9.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
IBM Cloudant
IBM Cloudant
Score 9.3 out of 10
Redis™*
Redis™*
Score 9.0 out of 10
Enterprises
IBM Cloudant
IBM Cloudant
Score 9.3 out of 10
Redis™*
Redis™*
Score 9.0 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Amazon DynamoDBPostgreSQL
Likelihood to Recommend
9.2
(37 ratings)
8.8
(53 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.4
(33 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Usability
8.4
(4 ratings)
9.0
(6 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(2 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
7.0
(2 ratings)
Support Rating
6.8
(4 ratings)
9.4
(13 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(3 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
8.0
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Amazon DynamoDBPostgreSQL
Likelihood to Recommend
Amazon AWS
DynamoDB is a great service if you are looking for a quick and easy way to store NoSQL data in the cloud and do not want to be concerned with managing the server or infrastructure. If you are already invested in AWS, the value proposition is even higher as it works very well with the other services that AWS provides.
Read full review
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
PostgreSQL, unlike other databases, is user-friendly and uses an open-source database. Ideal for relational databases, they can be accessed when speed and efficiency are required. It enables high-availability and disaster recovery replication from instance to instance. PostgreSQL can store data in a JSON format, including hashes, keys, and values. Multi-platform compatibility is also a big selling point. We could, however, use all the DBMS’s cores. While it works well in fast environments, it can be problematic in slower ones or cause multiple master replication.
Read full review
Pros
Amazon AWS
  • It's very easy to get started, creating a table with a partition/sort key and you're on your way.
  • You can scale up and down your read/write IO as needed.
  • You can store structured and unstructured data.
  • It works great with Web Development as it's JSON based.
Read full review
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
  • The stability it offers, its speed of response and its resource management is excellent even in complex database environments and with low-resource machines.
  • The large amount of resources it has in addition to the many own and third-party tools that are compatible that make productivity greatly increase.
  • The adaptability in various environments, whether distributed or not, [is a] complete set of configuration options which allows to greatly customize the work configuration according to the needs that are required.
  • The excellent handling of referential and transactional integrity, its internal security scheme, the ease with which we can create backups are some of the strengths that can be mentioned.
Read full review
Cons
Amazon AWS
  • Complex searching (no support for case-insensitive or full-text search).
  • Only supports up to two-key indexes.
  • Requires choosing the indexes up-front when doing searches.
  • Does not have an SQL compatible query front-end.
  • No join-table support (requires putting all data into one table).
Read full review
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
  • The query syntax for JSON fields is unwieldy when you start getting into complex queries with many joins.
  • I wish there was a distinction (a flag) you could set for automated scripts vs working in the psql CLI, which would provide an 'Are you sure you want to do X?' type prompt if your query is likely to affect more than a certain number of rows. Especially on updates/deletes. Setting the flag in the headless(scripted) flow would disable the prompt.
  • Better documentation around JSON and Array aggregation, with more examples of how the data is transformed.
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Likelihood to Renew
Amazon AWS
We will most likely continue to use DynamoDB for certain use-cases. If we stopped using DynamoDB as often, it would likely be because we started using Aurora Serverless more. Aurora Serverless may offer similar availability, management and cost benefits while allowing developers to use their MySQL tools and experience.
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PostgreSQL Global Development Group
As a needed software for day to day development activities
Read full review
Usability
Amazon AWS
Amazon DynamoDB has quite a lot of advantages :
Serverless to make usage and administration a breeze on a daily basis
Very fast lookup in a list of millions of items
Replication across region is quite easy to setup, albeit at an increased cost.
But despite all this, I would not give it a perfect 10 because I find its item size limit way too small for some of my uses.
Read full review
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
Postgresql is the best tool out there for relational data so I have to give it a high rating when it comes to analytics, data availability and consistency, so on and so forth. SQL is also a relatively consistent language so when it comes to building new tables and loading data in from the OLTP database, there are enough tools where we can perform ETL on a scalable basis.
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Reliability and Availability
Amazon AWS
No answers on this topic
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
PostgreSQL's availability is top notch. Apart from connection time-out for an idle user, the database is super reliable.
Read full review
Performance
Amazon AWS
No answers on this topic
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
The data queries are relatively quick for a small to medium sized table. With complex joins, and a wide and deep table however, the performance of the query has room for improvement.
Read full review
Support Rating
Amazon AWS
I have never contacted support for Amazon DynamoDB.
And I'm adding quite a lot of useless words to this explanation in order to reach the word count that is required despite the heading saying that I can skip this question. It seems there is then a bug here but what software does not have bugs?
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PostgreSQL Global Development Group
There are several companies that you can contract for technical support, like EnterpriseDB or Percona, both first level in expertise and commitment to the software.
But we do not have contracts with them, we have done all the way from googling to forums, and never have a problem that we cannot resolve or pass around. And for dozens of projects and more than 15 years now.
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Online Training
Amazon AWS
No answers on this topic
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
The online training is request based. Had there been recorded videos available online for potential users to benefit from, I could have rated it higher. The online documentation however is very helpful. The online documentation PDF is downloadable and allows users to pace their own learning. With examples and code snippets, the documentation is great starting point.
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Implementation Rating
Amazon AWS
No answers on this topic
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
The online documentation of the PostgreSQL product is elaborate and takes users step by step.
Read full review
Alternatives Considered
Amazon AWS
We evaluated using MongoDB or Amazon DyanmoDB. For us, the biggest advantage is that there's no maintenance cost for Amazon DynamoDB. Mongo gets complicated when you setup sharding. With Amazon DynamoDB, it's literally a push of button to increase throughput. This saves time and money on DevOps resources.
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PostgreSQL Global Development Group
Postgres stacks up just [fine] along the other big players in the RDBMS world. It's very popular for a reason. It's very close to MySQL in terms of cost and features - I'd pick either solution and be just as happy. Compared to Oracle it is a MUCH cheaper solution that is just as usable.
Read full review
Scalability
Amazon AWS
No answers on this topic
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
The DB is reliable, scalable, easy to use and resolves most DB needs
Read full review
Return on Investment
Amazon AWS
  • Since the Amazon manages the instance, the amount of time a developer needs to spend configuring the database is less. For comparison, if we were to manage the same instance manually, we need to set up EC2 instance, install the DB, setup backup scripts, track backup failures, which is a great overhead for the dev. Using DynamoDB this overhead is reduced and hence having a great ROI.
  • Great documentation and easy setup makes an easy learning curve to transition to DynamoDB. Only caveat is as with any database, the data structure should be thoroughly analyzed for types of querying because there are limitations with the DynamoDB API.
  • Ties very well with rest of the Amazon eco system. Having rest of the applications in Amazon allows managing the application security a breeze.
Read full review
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
  • The user-role system has saved us tons of time and thus money. As I mentioned in the "Use Case" section, Postgres is not only used by engineering but also finance to measure how much to charge customers and customer support to debug customer issues. Sure, it's not easy for non-technical employees to psql in and view raw tables, but it has saved engineering hundreds of man-hours that would have had to be spent on building equivalent tools to serve finance or customer support.
  • It provides incredibly trustworthy storage for wherever customer data dumped in. In our 6 years of Postgres existence, we have not lost a byte of customer data due to Postgres messing up a transaction or during the multiple times the hard-drives failed (thanks to ACID compliance!).
  • This is less significant, but Postgres is also quite easy to manage (unless you are going above and beyond to squeeze out every last bit of performance). There's not much to configure, and the out of the box settings are quite sane. That has saved us engineers lots of time that would have gone into Postgres administration.
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ScreenShots

Amazon DynamoDB Screenshots

Screenshot of Amazon DynamoDB in the AWS Console