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MariaDB vs PostgreSQL comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 12, 2025

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

MariaDB
Ranking in Open Source Databases
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
59
Ranking in other categories
Relational Databases Tools (5th)
PostgreSQL
Ranking in Open Source Databases
2nd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
125
Ranking in other categories
Vector Databases (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Open Source Databases category, the mindshare of MariaDB is 6.5%, down from 12.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of PostgreSQL is 18.2%, down from 21.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Open Source Databases
 

Featured Reviews

KumarManish - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to deploy, cost-effective, and integrates seamlessly with other products
We had planned for an RDBMS version and not NoSQL. We use MariaDB Galera Cluster. It's a good product. It is cheap, scalable, performs well, and is efficient. We use GCP’s BigQuery for machine learning. We must follow the best practices of the tool. We missed some best practices like the storage engine and InnoDB. It was very difficult to identify why we were having performance issues. Then, we realized that some of our tables were still on MyISAM, the default storage engine. When we switched it back to the InnoDB, it was very smooth. InnoDB is the recommended one. We must follow the best practices given in the documentation during the initial setup. Overall, I rate the product a nine out of ten.
AdityaSharma3 - PeerSpot reviewer
Transaction processes are fast and good replication capability
Use cases include querying data warehouses and databases to fetch data for clients already working on PostgreSQL.  We also use Postgres for building reports It's a transactional database, so we use Postgres for most of our reporting. That's where it's helping. The query speed is fast, and the…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"A valuable feature is that we can use it for quite a few things, all the things you'd expect from a server—along the lines of Linux's Lightweight Directory."
"Installation is straightforward."
"The documentation is quite straightforward."
"We like the easy way that we can collect data from other databases."
"The solution has PL/SQL compatibility."
"What I like best about MariaDB is that it is open-source and reliable."
"I like the global transaction IDs (GTIDs) feature. It's quite reliable for replication between a master and a replica server, and it's a feature that MySQL also has but implemented differently."
"I haven't faced any technical issues with the product, and it works fine."
"The product is very similar to the SQL Server."
"It's a standard reliable database management system."
"We are able to create many different types of jobs and items with this solution making it one of the most valuable features."
"The system can perform faster analysis by providing it with a lot of memory. Speed is crucial for analytics. Currently, the main reason we haven't adopted Elasticsearch is that we lack the necessary expertise to manage it."
"PostgreSQL is stable. It's available, stable, and reliable."
"The most valuable features are the price, stability, it is scalable and is used by our clients in small business environments, and it is a simple product to use."
"The solution has many valuable features such as it easy to use and the interface is intuitive."
"We often use PostgreSQL for operations monitoring because we are a manufacturing company."
 

Cons

"It doesn't have the same level of maturity metrics as Postgres."
"It would be good if they can maybe improve the mass import in the database. Currently, for importing a large number of data, we create a CSV file and upload all the things in the system. The system does not activate them by default. We have to do this manually. This may be due to the version we are using, but this is something we would like to see improved."
"The solution is not scalable."
"It does not have tools for debugging procedures and functions."
"One feedback I can quickly provide is the need for a robust IDE for MongoDB. The existing PHP admin console doesn't meet the client's requirements effectively."
"The stability could always continue to be improved upon."
"The GUI could be improved a bit. The user interface needs to be improved."
"There is room for improvement in terms of security."
"It still needs to be more mature and have some backup feature. We are normally dealing with Oracle's data, and we have very strong online tools to back up the data and do other things. PostgreSQL still needs to do more in this area as well as in the high availability area. There are many external tools that you can use for PostgreSQL's high availability, but there is no embedded tool within PostgreSQL for high availability. It could have a feature similar to Oracle for working on a distributed system. It can have some scripts to improve the monitoring and some tools to do performance analysis. We have a workaround for most of such requirements except for the support for a distributed system, which is very difficult to have. This area should be included in the core of the database itself."
"Sometimes, it becomes slow because of the network. So, there is room for improvement in performance."
"A better graphic user-interface would be nice to see."
"I find it difficult to get connectors on the tool. For example, .NET has only one free provider in PostgreSQL. I need to pay the provider if I need something more sophisticated features. Other languages like PHP and Java have good community support. We need community support for .NET."
"It could be improved by using parallelization. You want basically, distributed computing."
"It is possible that in the newer version this has been addressed, but I would like the deployment in microservices architecture could be improved."
"It could be more secure."
"The user interface could be a bit better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"My company uses the free version of the solution."
"The price could be less expensive."
"The solution is free, but if you want the enterprise version you will need to pay for some licenses but the cost is less than other solutions, such as Oracle."
"When it comes to MariaDB, it should have a more cost-effective license."
"This is an open-source product, which can be used free of charge."
"The tool is open-source."
"It is an open-source solution."
"MariaDB is a free-to-use solution."
"It is free. There is no license on it."
"The need for our customers to pay for licences is contingent on their projects and budgets."
"It is an open-source platform."
"It is also open-source so it is free."
"The solution requires a license."
"The tool is cheaply priced compared to other RDBMS providers in the market."
"This solution can offer a cheaper choice for customers since it is open-source."
"It is open source. There is no licensing."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Educational Organization
8%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about MariaDB?
The integration with other products is seamless.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for MariaDB?
I have found the price of commercial MariaDB to be pretty steep, although not as high as Oracle. Customers often prefer the Community Edition because it's free.
What needs improvement with MariaDB?
The only potential area for improvement could be the pricing model, which might benefit from being more flexible or a bit cheaper.
How does Firebird SQL compare with PostgreSQL?
PostgreSQL was designed in a way that provides you with not only a high degree of flexibility but also offers you a cheap and easy-to-use solution. It gives you the ability to redesign and audit yo...
What do you like most about PostgreSQL?
It's a transactional database, so we use Postgres for most of our reporting. That's where it's helping.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for PostgreSQL?
The tool is free of cost. For now, it's not about making money. But once we perfect it, we can offer it to customers willing to pay for support and other services. Most of my deployments are free.
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

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Find out what your peers are saying about MariaDB vs. PostgreSQL and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.