Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users
Senior Software Engineer at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Real User
Ensures the system is reliable and responsive for user security and convenience
Pros and Cons
  • "The most valuable features of Amazon RDS are its scalability, reliability, and intelligence."
  • "The only thing that needs improvement would be the pricing of the solution."

What is our primary use case?

I use Amazon RDS for my access control system, which manages permissions for users to enter places like universities, workspaces, and club team areas. Amazon RDS stores user data and keeps access permissions current, ensuring the system is reliable and responsive for user security and convenience.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable features of Amazon RDS are its scalability, reliability, and intelligence.

What needs improvement?

The only thing that needs improvement would be the pricing of the solution. Otherwise, it works very well as it is.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Amazon RDS for three years.

Buyer's Guide
Amazon RDS
November 2024
Learn what your peers think about Amazon RDS. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: November 2024.
814,763 professionals have used our research since 2012.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I would rate the stability a ten out of ten. I haven't had any issues with it so far.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Scalability is one of Amazon RDS's strongest points. I would rate it a nine out of ten.

How are customer service and support?

In 2019, we had a paid subscription for AWS technical support, not specifically for Amazon RDS. We reached out to them when we were conducting stress testing on our system and noticed a significant performance drop, but we couldn't identify the cause. AWS support was helpful. They opened a ticket, communicated with us, and worked with us to pinpoint the problem. Eventually, they helped us resolve the issue, which was valuable for our project.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I have previously used another DBaaS solution apart from AWS, which was Google Cloud Platform (GCP). In GCP, we used a PostgreSQL database. One standout feature of GCP that I appreciated was its robust monitoring tools, which were helpful for analyzing performance and identifying issues. While I can't speak in depth about AWS's monitoring capabilities, based on my experience, GCP's tools were quite beneficial in this regard.

How was the initial setup?

Setting up Amazon RDS is quite simple. First, you create an instance by specifying details like its name, storage preferences, and security settings. You can also choose to set up backups. After clicking "create," your RDS instance is ready within minutes. You receive connection parameters, which you use in your application to connect to the database. From there, you can start creating tables and storing data. It's a straightforward process that doesn't require much technical complexity. The deployment of Amazon RDS instance was very quick configuration took only a few minutes. It is an easy and cost-effective process, with a setup fee of around $31. Getting the connection parameters and establishing the connection to the database was seamless and efficient. Overall, it was a smooth and positive experience. 
Amazon RDS requires some maintenance, but it is not complicated. You might need to update the database configuration from time to time, which can be done by modifying your RDS instance. You can also schedule regular backups and updates provided by AWS. These changes can be controlled by you, so it is an organized process that ensures your database stays in good shape without much hassle. We have approximately 10,000 users of the solution at our company.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Amazon RDS is quite expensive.

What other advice do I have?

My advice for those starting with AWS products is to closely monitor your usage and expenses. With on-demand and pay-as-you-go services, it is easy to keep using resources without realizing the costs adding up. So, keep a close eye on your bills to control expenses, as pricing might seem small but can accumulate quickly. This is important for cost management in general, and it applies to AWS services too. Overall, I would rate Amazon RDS a nine out of ten.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
EVP Technology at a consultancy with 51-200 employees
Real User
Top 5
Excellent data warehouse capabilities
Pros and Cons
  • "One of the most valuable features is that it is serverless, so we don't have to worry about scaling."
  • "In the next release, it would be great to have access to core parameters to improve or tweak the performance."

What is our primary use case?

We use it for data warehousing and transforming data.

What is most valuable?

One of the most valuable features is that it is serverless, so we don't have to worry about scaling.

What needs improvement?

We don't have control over tweaking the database parameters, so we switched to Aurora.

In the next release, it would be great to have access to core parameters to improve or tweak the performance.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using it for five years. 

What other advice do I have?

I would give it a nine because it's a reliable and cost-effective solution.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Amazon RDS
November 2024
Learn what your peers think about Amazon RDS. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: November 2024.
814,763 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Principal engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Real User
AWS RDS is fully managed service and few manual intervention also automated by scripts.
Pros and Cons
  • "The most valuable feature is that it is a fully managed database, where they handle most of the administrative tasks and leaves the users more time to concentrate on business."
  • "It would be helpful if they made it easier to migrate from an existing on-premises solution to the cloud-based service."

What is our primary use case?

We have cloud infra and development teams and my job with this solution is to move them to a cloud architecture, so I create a migration plan for Database from on-premises to AWS Cloud , co-ordinate with teams to host the planned RDS solutions and provide support for post cloud hosting challenges for better customer experience. 

How has it helped my organization?

Few minutes to launch RDS, DR, HA and monitoring configurations which reduced the administrative task and by the approach of pay for what we use reduced the cost. Performance is good when both Web application and DB are in same cloud. Need to be have In depth understanding of cost, else we are in position to pay more, which makes us to think our own DB is better when cost is very huge amount.  


What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature is that it is a fully managed database, where they handle most of the administrative tasks and leaves the users more time to concentrate on business.

What needs improvement?

The fact that it is fully managed has some disadvantages, as well. I have worked on SQL Server, Oracle, and other RDBMS systems for more than 20 years. In many of these cases, I have been an administrator and required administrative privileges to perform many of the tasks that I did. As I now work on a fully managed and maintained database, it is taking me longer to figure out how to perform these same operations that I was used to doing on-premises. Essentially, having a great deal of experience as an RDBMS administrator has made it harder for me to move forward when working on a database that is fully managed. It would be helpful if they made it easier to migrate from an existing on-premises solution to the cloud-based service.

Technical support could use some improvement.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Amazon RDS for five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability of this solution is good. We did have a couple of problems last year when the database was absconded, but luckily we had snapshots available. They take six backups daily and we were able to easily restore. We did not suffer any data loss.

I make use of this solution on a daily basis, especially over the past few years. We are migrating and I do work on the on-premises data centers, which is our core area. But, from a cost perspective, we are working towards hosting our business entirely in AWS.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The scalability of Amazon RDS is very good.

We have between 5,000 and 6,000 users.

How are customer service and technical support?

We have contacted technical support over several issues and use cases. We build a use case and they suggest solutions. I do like them, but each use case is different and I have seen a lot of room for them to improve over time.

How was the initial setup?

We initially deployed Amazon RDS on-premises, although we are now migrating to cloud-based deployment. Spinning up a task is very easy and there is no maintenance. There are no administrative tasks involved for us because it is entirely taken care of. This includes monitoring and backup, as well.

The length of time for deployment depends on the size of the database. If they say it is one gigabyte then it will take a few minutes.

What about the implementation team?

We have technical people who are certified and handle the deployment in-house.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Good amount of cost reduction in cloud but we need to have well defined monitoring rules to save cost even after hosted in cloud. You can scale-up and scale-down with minimal duration compare to on-prem DB Servers. Which add more cost benefits. 

We can BYOL (Bring Your Own License), if you already purchased for Microsoft SQL Server or for Oracle and use that during RDS launch. 

If you need to reduce licensing cost in database , we can migrate to 3 open source databases in AWS RDS : MySQL, PostgreSQL, and MariaDB.

Amazon Aurora RDS , which is compatible to MySQL Engine and PostgreSQL Engine can be used to get most benefit of RDS managed service with performance and cost since it is AWS native RDS.

What other advice do I have?

We have reached the stage where all of our critical applications are hosted on-premises, and the rest is hosted with a public cloud provider. We found that at one stage, it was more advantageous to store some of our core data in our own data centers and have the rest managed.

My advice for people who are implementing this solution is to keep in mind that they need to redefine their product. It is not just a copy of an on-premises solution. Rather, it is designed with cloud architecture in mind. We use the term Cloud Adaptiveness. This means that before moving, they need to make sure that the architect of that application, the business owner, and the database administrator all realize that they are going to be migrating to the cloud. They will need to make some modifications before it happens. Otherwise, if they try to do it post-migration, it will be more difficult.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
CTO at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
Real User
Extremely stable and easy to use but the pricing can get expensive without proper provisioning
Pros and Cons
  • "The product is very, very easy to use."
  • "You can only get access from the sales support. That means if you want to buy something or renew your subscription or upgrade, all these services are easily available. Yet, if you would like to get some technical support, you have to pay for it. You have to pay for an additional subscription."

What is our primary use case?

This product is used primarily for storing data. The process is you have to reserve RDS space and then you can install any database scheme you want, for example, MariaDB, SQL or Aurora. We typically use Aurora DB. 

What is most valuable?

The solution has proven to be quite stable so far.

The product is very, very easy to use.

What needs improvement?

The only thing that I can say is, you have to be really careful about the Cloud provision plannings - meaning that you should calculate the cost carefully due to the fact that the bill is increased sharply if you increase the limit. You have to provision what you need per month.

The solution charges for technical support, which is something they should change, at least for those organizations on tier one.

For how long have I used the solution?

We've only been using this solution for six months. It's been less than a year. We haven't been using it for too long just yet.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We've found this solution to be very stable. It's reliable. We don't really deal with bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. So far, it's been very good.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The solution is fully scalable. If a company needs to expand it, it can do so with ease.

Everyone in our organization uses the product. It's pretty widespread. The idea is you save your data on Cloud and make it available to everybody, add it to your website.

We plan to continue to use this service, at least over the next year or so.

How are customer service and technical support?

Technical support is not ideal. It's one of Amazon's pain points.

Amazon offers a free service tier, a so-called free tier for start-ups. We are a start-up. By the time that you sign up with Amazon, you're connected to the free tier, however, for some reason, you don't have access to the support.

You can only get access from the sales support. That means if you want to buy something or renew your subscription or upgrade, all these services are easily available. Yet, if you would like to get some technical support, you have to pay for it. You have to pay for an additional subscription. It's really too bad.

Everybody using cloud computing needs technical support at some point, so this jeopardizes the original promise of the free tier. If you have to pay for any given question to the technical department, it is not free anymore. That's really a drawback in terms of Amazon's service. 

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

There are alternatives to RDS, and therefore you can use another type of cloud computing if you like. However, I haven't used any.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

While, with all services of Amazon, there is a starter option that is given for free, this starter offer is not enough for the development or the deployment of products. Each time you pass these limits, you have to pay and it's completely unpredictable.

The pricing can get very expensive. You pay a standard price, which is low, for a fixed reservation. However, if you exceed your limit, instantly, then the bill is increased tremendously. That's a drawback for the system. You have to provision very carefully and to make sure that you do not exceed the limit.

That said, after careful provisioning, it is a very cheap option. If you are successful at cloud provisioning, you won't need to pay much.

You do have to pay extra for technical support, even if you are on the free service tier.

What other advice do I have?

Despite the issues around pricing and technical support, RDS is a good choice for organizations due to the fact that it's very easy to use. I'd recommend it to others due to this ease of use and general stability.

Overall, I would rate the solution at a seven out of ten. If they had a free technical support tier I might rate it higher.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
PeerSpot user
Cloud Architect, Oracle ACE, Oracle DBA at Pythian
MSP
Provides deployment and on-demand database-as-a-service.

What is most valuable?

RDS provides deployment agility and an on-demand database-as-a-service for MySQL, Oracle, and SQL servers.

With RDS, everything is turnkey and always available. For example, due to the inherent multi-availability zone feature of AWS, there is no downtime at all and you can count on AWS RDS to always be available.

How has it helped my organization?

For many of the Pythian customers, one salient benefit, among other benefits, is the option of spinning up a new instance whenever it is needed. Now it can be done with a few clicks, without much ado.

What needs improvement?

RDS doesn't have shell access. This could be beneficial, especially for Oracle databases.

One benefit of having shell access with RDS is that DBAs or developers could keep their own existing scripts. Especially in the case of non-enterprise versions, there is always a need to dig into performance issues and their troubleshooting. So shell access could be very handy in that case and in some other cases.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using AWS RDS for the last two years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We have not really had stability issues.

How are customer service and technical support?

The technical support is good and prompt.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

For many clients of Pythian, it’s an amalgamation of on-premises and cloud. Pythian enables its customers to reap the benefits of both worlds.

How was the initial setup?

With the expertise and experience of Pythian, the initial setup was a breeze.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Read the fine print carefully and always engage experts to carry out migration.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We did not evaluate any alternatives.

What other advice do I have?

Having your database on RDS doesn't mean that you don't need a DBA anymore. Mission critical and important databases must be handled by a DBA, even if the database resides on the cloud, like RDS.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Data Engineer at Elastacloud
Real User
A distributed relational database service with good technical support, but the price could be better
Pros and Cons
  • "The initial setup is straightforward, and technical support is good."
  • "I also don't think it's very scalable."

What is our primary use case?

We are using AWS RDS to have a database that we're not using at the moment. I'm not making any changes to the parameter of the database or the configuration of the database on AWS. I just have to open a new port on the map of the network to have a connection to the prepaid network.

What is most valuable?

The initial setup is straightforward, and technical support is good.

What needs improvement?

The price could be better. We have better options like Microsoft Azure to use in the cloud. I also don't think it's very scalable. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using Amazon RDS for almost five months.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I don't think it's very scalable. In comparison, Microsoft Azure has many options. In RDS, I couldn't even find many options to increase or to perform a scale up or scale down.

How are customer service and technical support?

Technical support is good.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is straightforward because our data isn't difficult to manage. But there are a few things that take some time or become hard to manage because we have many security and network configurations. I need to rush through the connection between my machine and the cloud to bypass our prepaid network, and that makes things a little bit harder. But it's not too complicated.

What about the implementation team?

At the time, we needed to deploy by ourselves, manually. I think it took just one or two of us to implement and maintain this solution.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The price could be better.

What other advice do I have?

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Amazon RDS a seven.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
it_user422652 - PeerSpot reviewer
DBA at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Consultant
A valuable feature is the easy creation of new databases. Migration to RDS using the default tools is complicated.

What is most valuable?

  • Easy creation of new databases
  • Maintenance is fully automatic (backups, monitoring, and patches)

How has it helped my organization?

We are using it as shared QA environment.

What needs improvement?

Migration to RDS using the default tools is very complicated.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have used this product for one year.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We have not had stability problems. It is much more stable than a standard datacenter.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

This had the same scalability issues as Oracle databases on premise.

How are customer service and technical support?

We have never needed technical support.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We did not have a previous solution.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was very simple.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I am using BYOL.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We evaluated Oracle database on-premises on Amazon EC2 and on Oracle Cloud.

What other advice do I have?

It requires time to adapt to the idea that you do not have any access to the O/S.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Head of Data Projects at Cognitivo
Real User
A distributed relational database service that's simple to implement and to start using
Pros and Cons
  • "For me, RDS is a great solution. I like that Amazon RDS is a very simple solution to implement and to start using."
  • "It would be better if it integrated seamlessly with Microsoft products. Our clients use the Microsoft Tally application server. We already tried to create a reputation from, for example, an on-premises environment from our client to Amazon RDS using Microsoft Tally server, and we couldn't do that because we didn't have a strong user in RDS. We couldn't create a reputation from an on-premises environment from the Microsoft Tally server to RDS. I think that it would be a good implementation, and it would help us with this case."

What is our primary use case?

We deployed RDS in our environment, and our use case is so simple. We don't have large-scale use, but we will start using RDS with more users. For now, we deployed it, and we use RDS with only a few users.

What is most valuable?

For me, RDS is a great solution. I like that Amazon RDS is a very simple solution to implement and to start using.

What needs improvement?

It would be better if it integrated seamlessly with Microsoft products. Our clients use the Microsoft Tally application server. We already tried to create a reputation, for example, an on-premises environment from our client to Amazon RDS using the Microsoft Tally server. But we couldn't do that because we didn't have a strong user in RDS. We couldn't create a reputation from an on-premises environment from the Microsoft Tally server to RDS. I think that it would be a good implementation, and it would help us with this case.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is straightforward. 

What other advice do I have?

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Amazon RDS a ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Amazon RDS Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: November 2024
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Amazon RDS Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.