CockroachDB vs LocalDB comparison

Cockroach and Microsoft are both solutions in the Relational Databases Tools category. Cockroach is ranked #12 with an average rating of 8.4, while Microsoft is ranked #17 with an average rating of 8.5. Cockroach holds a 3.7% mindshare in SQL, compared to Microsoft’s 2.8% mindshare. Additionally, 83% of Cockroach users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Microsoft users who would recommend it.

CockroachDB

Read 12 CockroachDB reviews

2,677 Views
1,856 Comparison Views

83% willing to recommend

LocalDB

Read 6 LocalDB reviews

2,094 Views
1,752 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

CockroachDB

LocalDB

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 4, 2025

LocalDB and CockroachDB are competitive products in the database management category. CockroachDB has the upper hand due to its advanced scalability and resilience, making it more suitable for growing enterprises requiring reliable data distribution and availability.

Features: LocalDB is known for its ease of integration with Microsoft technologies, reliability in Windows environments, and budget-conscious pricing. CockroachDB offers distributed SQL capabilities, fault tolerance with seamless replication, and geo-partitioning to address data residency issues across multiple regions.

Room for Improvement: LocalDB could enhance its features by improving scalability for large-scale applications, expanding its support for non-Windows platforms, and offering more advanced security features. CockroachDB might benefit from simplifying its initial deployment process, reducing the technical expertise required, and improving the ease of use for performance tuning.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: LocalDB benefits from a straightforward installation process within Windows ecosystems and offers accessible customer service, making initial deployment simpler. CockroachDB requires a more complex setup but supports cloud-native operations with a deployment model for distributed systems and a support structure for advanced needs.

Pricing and ROI: LocalDB is budget-friendly with a low setup cost, advantageous for businesses invested in Microsoft infrastructure, leading to faster ROI. CockroachDB involves a higher upfront cost but aligns with its feature set and scalability, offering substantial long-term ROI for enterprises needing dependable data distribution and availability.

To learn more, read our detailed CockroachDB vs. LocalDB Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

CockroachDB vs. LocalDB

April 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

CockroachDB

Ranking in Relational Databases Tools

12th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

LocalDB

Ranking in Relational Databases Tools

17th

Average Rating

9.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Relational Databases Tools category, the mindshare of CockroachDB is 3.7%, up from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of LocalDB is 2.8%, up from 2.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Relational Databases Tools

Featured Reviews

Antonio Tringali

Software Engineer at a consultancy with self employed

Open source with extensive documentation and a University for training

I am a freelancer. A client of mine wanted a solution that would allow them to scale yet not abandon the familiar PostgreSQL front-end (and rewrite a part of their source code). Scalability aside, CockroachDB is a fine way forward from PostgreSQL and is not changing the client source code part of the system. If you are lucky and you do not use newer features from recent versions of PostgreSQL or PostgreSQL extensions, it's fine. There are nice-to-have features for big organizations like regional tables. At the moment, my client simply does not use these. However, the serverless offer from CockroachDB is reacting well as data grows.

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Srini-Dhanaraj

Founder & CEO at imfine.club

The database always has structured data, like rows, columns, and bases

LocalDB is an excellent solution for learners, beginners, and projects of negligible size; it is very good. Any startup can use a local database to start. Once they grow beyond its limits, they can migrate to a MS SQL server that's also available on-premises. I rate it ten out of ten.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The availability and the easy to use feature is the most valuable. The documentation is also good."

"The best feature of CockroachDB is the ability to keep the nodes in different locations."

"The most valuable features of the solution are its resiliency features and the geo-partitioning capabilities."

"The product has valuable security features."

"The initial setup and deployment are simple."

"The subset of SQL that my client is using is completely supported."

"The most valuable feature is that CockroachDB is a distributed database, which can deploy nodes running in different regions."

"CockroachDB is highly reliable."

More CockroachDB pros

"LocalDB is an excellent solution for learners, beginners, and projects of negligible size; it is very good."

"The solution is fast."

"The initial setup is very straightforward. The guidelines are very easy to follow. Maintenance is very easy and requires very little manpower."

"The initial setup was simple."

"The most valuable feature of LocalDBis the connection between the application and DB."

Cons

"I would like CockroachDB to have more compatibility with PostgreSQL, especially with the connection string and technical integrations."

"The product must improve its disaster recovery features."

"I think the engine itself could be improved. If you miss a partition key, it should be able to be modeled. This is where AI could be really helpful. For example, if a user is from Australia, the system should know to look for their data there first instead of searching in the US or another continent."

"The platform could be more extensible."

"The closer they can make CockroachDB to being completely compatible with Postgres, the better. It's almost compatible, but not completely. If it was, it would be nice to just be able to use Postgres libraries without any fiddling."

"CockroachDB needs to improve store processes."

"The initial setup and pricing could be improved."

"We are looking for more features to support distributed high availability and geo-partitioning."

More CockroachDB cons

"It is only for a small amount of data. Local DB is made for the purpose of small-volume optics."

"The solution needs to create a management tool. Right now, the solution has tools for creating a local installation, but it's too simplistic. We need something that's a bit more complex so that we can extend the tools with our scripts."

"The ALM features can be improved, but the database by itself is reliable."

"The initial setup is complex and requires a skilled person."

"The internal connection features of LocalDB could improve."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The platform is affordable even for the enterprise version. It provides value for investment in terms of performance."

"The product's price depends on the user's company and the contract model they enter into with CockroachDB. Depending on the contract model one enters into with CockroachDB, the product may or may not be expensive."

"I've used CockroachDB at a small scale on the free accounts because we are only testing."

"The solution's pricing is not cheap. However, the good thing is that customers are willing to pay for it if they want it."

"The pricing is good but can be made cheaper. I would rate the pricing a five out of ten."

"The fees are fair."

"The licensing cost is too high for LocalDB."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

37%

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

Retailer

Financial Services Firm

15%

Computer Software Company

13%

Government

10%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about CockroachDB?

The subset of SQL that my client is using is completely supported.

See all answers

What needs improvement with CockroachDB?

I would like CockroachDB to have more compatibility with PostgreSQL, especially with the connection string and technical integrations.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for CockroachDB?

I am studying how to deploy CockroachDB and YugaByteDB, and learning some basic information about them. I am testing these databases as part of my school application to find a suitable database for...

See all answers

What do you like most about LocalDB?

The solution is fast.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for LocalDB?

It's free of cost.

See all answers

What needs improvement with LocalDB?

Technically speaking, you don't need to get any updates because it's not online. It's on-premise. So once it is installed, then you get a desktop-grade version. But the purpose of LocalDB is not th...

See all answers

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Compared 83% of the time

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Compared 9% of the time

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Compared 4% of the time

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Compared 4% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

CockroachDB

April 2025

Download CockroachDB product report

Buyer's Guide

Relational Databases Tools

March 2025

Download LocalDB product report

Overview

CockroachDB is a distributed SQL database built on a transactional and strongly-consistent key-value store. It scales horizontally; survives disk, machine, rack, and even datacenter failures with minimal latency disruption and no manual intervention; supports strongly-consistent ACID transactions; and provides a familiar SQL API for structuring, manipulating, and querying data.

CockroachDB is inspired by Google’s Spanner and F1 technologies, and it’s completely open source.

Cockroach

LocalDB is a lightweight version of the SQL Server Express Database Engine that is targeted for program development. LocalDB starts on demand and runs in user mode, so there is no complex configuration.

Microsoft

Sample Customers

Baidu, Kindred, Tierion, Heroic Labs, Gorgias

AstraZeneca, Kienzle Automotive GmbH, Kodak Alaris, Unilever, Floatel International and Kongsberg Maritime, MyHero

Buyer's Guide

CockroachDB vs. LocalDB

April 2025

Free Report: CockroachDB vs. LocalDB

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