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Cassandra vs PostgreSQL comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 5, 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

Cassandra
Ranking in Vector Databases
15th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
NoSQL Databases (4th)
PostgreSQL
Ranking in Vector Databases
9th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
125
Ranking in other categories
Open Source Databases (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Vector Databases category, the mindshare of Cassandra is 1.8%, down from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of PostgreSQL is 4.9%, up from 3.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Vector Databases
 

Featured Reviews

Himanshu Amodwala - PeerSpot reviewer
Well-equipped to handle a massive influx of data and billions of requests
The use of Cassandra in real-time data analytics has been pivotal for our e-commerce platform. As our platform operates 24/7, providing services to sellers and customers alike, the need for real-time updates is paramount. For instance, when a customer leaves comments or feedback on an image, they anticipate an immediate reflection of these changes on the portal. Similarly, sellers altering product attributes or updating images expect instant visibility of these modifications. Handling large data volumes with Cassandra has been an excellent experience. Despite challenges related to the influx, these were not attributed to Cassandra itself but rather to middle-layer issues. Generally, it demonstrated scalability with workloads, thanks to its horizontal scaling capabilities. We could easily add new nodes to the system as needed, ensuring the platform coped well with increasing loads. The tool's most beneficial feature for scalability is its entire architecture. The absence of a single point of failure or a leader within the ecosystem contributes to its robust scalability. This key aspect influenced our decision to opt for the Cassandra ecosystem. In terms of performance, it demonstrated the ability to handle approximately 1.6 billion requests per day. This was achieved on AWS using EC2 instances, and it was during a period about four to five years ago.
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

"The most valuable features are the counter features and the NoSQL schema. It also has good scalability. You can scale Cassandra to any finite level."
"We can add almost one million columns to the solution."
"The most valuable features of Cassandra are its scaling capabilities and its non-SQL nature capabilities."
"The solution's database capabilities are very good."
"The most valuable features of this solution are its speed and distributed nature."
"The time series data was one of the best features along with auto publishing."
"The most valuable features of Cassandra are the NoSQL database, high performance, and zero-copy streaming."
"A consistent solution."
"Initial setup is simple."
"The initial setup is quick and easy."
"It is easy to use."
"It's quite scalable."
"We use the solution to store tables. It is stable and performs well."
"It is very useful for both structured and unstructured data. You can store unstructured and structured data in PostgreSQL. It is easy to use. You can easily manage things through PostgreSQL Admin. It is cost-effective. Its on-premise version is free. It is agnostic of on-premise or cloud. You can install it on the cloud or on-premises. It is available with all clouds, and you can also install it on desktop or Windows Servers."
"I like that you can move any relational database from Oracle to PostgreSQL. I also like that it's pretty stable."
"We often use PostgreSQL for operations monitoring because we are a manufacturing company."
 

Cons

"While Cassandra can handle NoSQL, I think there should be more flexibility for whole schema design when data is stored in wide columns. Additionally, I believe that eventual consistency should be enhanced."
"Depending upon our schema, we can't make ORDER BY or GROUP BY clauses in the product."
"Cassandra could be more user-friendly like MongoDB."
"The solution is not easy to use because it is a big database and you have to learn the interface. This is the case though in most of these solutions."
"I want Cassandra to update its open-source version more quickly. It's already feature-rich, but I'd appreciate better integration with other NoSQL databases like MariaDB or MongoDB. If I ever need to work with customers or vendors using different NoSQL databases, having native integration in Cassandra would make managing and interacting with their databases much easier."
"The solution is limited to a linear performance."
"Fine-tuning was a bit of a challenge."
"Cassandra can improve by adding more built-in tools. For example, if you want to do some maintenance activities in the cluster, we have to depend on third-party tools. Having these tools build-in would be e benefit."
"The scalability is limited."
"There are several features I would like to improve that aren't working as expected. It's likely that the latest version is doing something that was missed in the previous versions. For example, the output parameters — the stored procedures — is something new in PostgreSQL that Firebird has already had for a long time."
"The price could be better."
"As PostgreSQL is an open-source product, you do have to do a bit more configuration and management yourself."
"PostgreSQL could improve by providing a geographical solution for tracking trucks and people in the field. They might already have features similar to this and I have not found them. I haven't done research about this topic."
"The database and applications can become very slow."
"It could be more secure."
"There could be a plugin to distribute the data on servers for the product."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We pay for a license."
"I don't have the specific numbers on pricing, but it was fairly priced."
"There are licensing fees that must be paid, but I'm not sure if they are paid monthly or yearly."
"Cassandra is a free open source solution, but there is a commercial version available called DataStax Enterprise."
"We are using the open-source version of Cassandra, the solution is free."
"I use the tool's open-source version."
"The need for our customers to pay for licences is contingent on their projects and budgets."
"Affordable solution."
"There is an annual license."
"It is free. In terms of operating costs, it basically needs the same platform on which Oracle runs."
"The licensing model is good."
"It is free, but if you need support, you can go for the commercial version called EnterpriseDB. They provide paid support, and they can even do hosting for you if you want standby and support."
"It is open source. There is no licensing."
"This solution can offer a cheaper choice for customers since it is open-source."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
22%
Computer Software Company
15%
Comms Service Provider
5%
University
5%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cassandra?
The use of Cassandra in real-time data analytics has been pivotal for our e-commerce platform. As our platform operates 24/7, providing services to sellers and customers alike, the need for real-ti...
What needs improvement with Cassandra?
While Cassandra can handle NoSQL, I think there should be more flexibility for whole schema design when data is stored in wide columns. Additionally, I believe that eventual consistency should be e...
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 Cassandra vs. PostgreSQL and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
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