Relative Merits of NoSQL vs Distributed SQL
The tradeoffs between relational SQL and non-relational NoSQL databases have become familiar. Relational databases provide strong consistency, but they can be difficult to scale. Non-relational databases scale more easily, but they generally offer less strict consistency guarantees. A new class of database, known as Distributed SQL (or NewSQL), promises both strong consistency and the ability to scale.
In this paper, we compare ScyllaDB, a highly available, distributed, best-of-breed NoSQL database, against the best-in-class Distributed SQL database, CockroachDB. This paper includes performance benchmarks that are, admittedly, apples-to-oranges comparisons – as the two databases utilize radically different architectures.
Read the whitepaper to learn:
- An overview of the differences between NoSQL and Distributed SQL
- Tradeoffs between Availability and Consistency
- Architectural differences between NoSQL and Distributed SQL
- YCSB Benchmark results for ScyllaDB and CockroachDB