Apache Spark vs. PostgreSQL

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Apache Spark
Score 8.9 out of 10
N/A
Apache Spark is a multi-language engine for executing data engineering, data science, and machine learning on single-node machines or clusters.N/A
PostgreSQL
Score 8.7 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
Apache SparkPostgreSQL
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Apache SparkPostgreSQL
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
Apache SparkPostgreSQL
Considered Both Products
Apache Spark

No answer on this topic

PostgreSQL
Chose PostgreSQL
MySQL is an Oracle product which has in itself some known issues due to that (support, contract terms). Based on my knowledge, PostgreSQL support everything that MySQL support (syntax wise) and it adds more improvements and syntaxes that make the life of database engineers and …
Chose PostgreSQL
I found PostgreSQL to be better compared to MySQL. The community support is very good. Some features that I feel are not present in MySQL are:
  • No referential integrity.
  • No constraints (CHECK).
Chose PostgreSQL
Compared to MySQL, it works well if you need to extend to your use case
Compared to Spark, it works better w.r.t development time in a central database setting
Like Redis, it cannot be used for caching and quick access of non-structured data
Best Alternatives
Apache SparkPostgreSQL
Small Businesses

No answers on this topic

InfluxDB
InfluxDB
Score 8.8 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Cloudera Manager
Cloudera Manager
Score 9.9 out of 10
SQLite
SQLite
Score 8.0 out of 10
Enterprises
IBM Analytics Engine
IBM Analytics Engine
Score 7.2 out of 10
SQLite
SQLite
Score 8.0 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Apache SparkPostgreSQL
Likelihood to Recommend
9.0
(24 ratings)
8.0
(55 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
10.0
(1 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Usability
8.0
(4 ratings)
8.3
(9 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
7.0
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
8.7
(4 ratings)
9.3
(7 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
8.0
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Apache SparkPostgreSQL
Likelihood to Recommend
Apache
Well suited: To most of the local run of datasets and non-prod systems - scalability is not a problem at all. Including data from multiple types of data sources is an added advantage. MLlib is a decently nice built-in library that can be used for most of the ML tasks. Less appropriate: We had to work on a RecSys where the music dataset that we used was around 300+Gb in size. We faced memory-based issues. Few times we also got memory errors. Also the MLlib library does not have support for advanced analytics and deep-learning frameworks support. Understanding the internals of the working of Apache Spark for beginners is highly not possible.
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PostgreSQL Global Development Group
PostgreSQL is best used for structured data, and best when following relational database design principles. I would not use PostgreSQL for large unstructured data such as video, images, sound files, xml documents, web-pages, especially if these files have their own highly variable, internal structure.
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Pros
Apache
  • Rich APIs for data transformation making for very each to transform and prepare data in a distributed environment without worrying about memory issues
  • Faster in execution times compare to Hadoop and PIG Latin
  • Easy SQL interface to the same data set for people who are comfortable to explore data in a declarative manner
  • Interoperability between SQL and Scala / Python style of munging data
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PostgreSQL Global Development Group
  • It works well with external data sources and runs on platforms with stable performance.
  • Clients can rest assured that their personal information will be safe and secure.
  • Many forums discuss setup and usage, and most are free.
  • Adding tooling applications to a computer is unlimited.
  • PostgreSQL runs on many OS platforms and supports ANSI SQL, stored procedures, and triggers.
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Cons
Apache
  • Memory management. Very weak on that.
  • PySpark not as robust as scala with spark.
  • spark master HA is needed. Not as HA as it should be.
  • Locality should not be a necessity, but does help improvement. But would prefer no locality
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PostgreSQL Global Development Group
  • Clearer indications on what is the query plan, to optimize the query
  • More out of the box, Postgres specific, SQL functions
  • It would be nice to have a more visual aid of the relationship between all tables, but possibly this depend more on the UI used
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Likelihood to Renew
Apache
Capacity of computing data in cluster and fast speed.
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PostgreSQL Global Development Group
As a needed software for day to day development activities
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Usability
Apache
If the team looking to use Apache Spark is not used to debug and tweak settings for jobs to ensure maximum optimizations, it can be frustrating. However, the documentation and the support of the community on the internet can help resolve most issues. Moreover, it is highly configurable and it integrates with different tools (eg: it can be used by dbt core), which increase the scenarios where it can be used
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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
Apache
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.
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Performance
Apache
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.
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Support Rating
Apache
1. It integrates very well with scala or python. 2. It's very easy to understand SQL interoperability. 3. Apache is way faster than the other competitive technologies. 4. The support from the Apache community is very huge for Spark. 5. Execution times are faster as compared to others. 6. There are a large number of forums available for Apache Spark. 7. The code availability for Apache Spark is simpler and easy to gain access to. 8. Many organizations use Apache Spark, so many solutions are available for existing applications.
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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
Apache
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
Apache
No answers on this topic
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
The online documentation of the PostgreSQL product is elaborate and takes users step by step.
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Alternatives Considered
Apache
Spark in comparison to similar technologies ends up being a one stop shop. You can achieve so much with this one framework instead of having to stitch and weave multiple technologies from the Hadoop stack, all while getting incredibility performance, minimal boilerplate, and getting the ability to write your application in the language of your choosing.
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PostgreSQL Global Development Group
Although the competition between the different databases is increasingly aggressive in the sense that they provide many improvements, new functionalities, compatibility with complementary components or environments, in some cases it requires that it be followed within the same family of applications that performs the company that develops it and that is not all bad, but being able to adapt or configure different programs, applications or other environments developed by third parties apart is what gives PostgreSQL a certain advantage and this diversification in the components that can be joined with it, is the reason why it is a great option to choose.
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Scalability
Apache
No answers on this topic
PostgreSQL Global Development Group
The DB is reliable, scalable, easy to use and resolves most DB needs
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Return on Investment
Apache
  • Business leaders are able to take data driven decisions
  • Business users are able access to data in near real time now . Before using spark, they had to wait for at least 24 hours for data to be available
  • Business is able come up with new product ideas
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PostgreSQL Global Development Group
  • Easy to administer so our DevOps team has only ever used minimal time to setup, tune, and maintain.
  • Easy to interface with so our Engineering team has only ever used minimal time to query or modify the database. Getting the data is straightforward, what we do with it is the bigger concern.
  • It's free. You can't beat that.
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