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Google Cloud SQL vs Google Cloud Spanner comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 12, 2024

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

Google Cloud Spanner
Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)
8th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Google Cloud SQL
Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category, the mindshare of Google Cloud Spanner is 5.1%, up from 3.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Google Cloud SQL is 11.3%, down from 17.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Database as a Service (DBaaS) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Google Cloud SQL11.3%
Google Cloud Spanner5.1%
Other83.6%
Database as a Service (DBaaS)
 

Featured Reviews

Saurav Krishna - PeerSpot reviewer
A stable but expensive solution that needs to look into the horizontal scaling feature
The tool needs to improve horizontal scaling.  I have been using the product for a year.  Google Cloud Spanner is stable.  My company has 15-20 users for the product.  The tool's deployment is easy.  The solution is expensive.  You need to look at the data set and company requirements. I rate…
Prathap Sankar - PeerSpot reviewer
Gain control and flexibility with customizable tools but has slower performance
I am majorly working in Google Cloud SQL for building my applications Google Cloud SQL provides complete customization options, along with a dashboarding tool and a comprehensive suite of tools that can be used to customize and build any application needed. The deployment model allows for…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is a very scalable solution."
"Google Cloud Spanner is stable."
"The application deployment in the cloud is the best feature of the infrastructure."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its scalability. Scalability comes with two options, among which Google Cloud Spanner can scale horizontally, compared to other relational databases that scale vertically."
"We can scale the solution if we need to."
"The implementation part of the product was easy."
"This is a stable solution and offers good performance."
"It's SQL. SQL is so easy if you know something about databases. It's easy to learn."
"The valuable feature of Google Cloud SQL is its high availability option. The product is stable."
"The setup was straightforward. Just a couple of clicks, and we were done."
"The product is scalable."
"The most valuable feature for us is the Postgres on Google Cloud SQL since it supports most of the features we need."
"Google Cloud SQL is highly scalable."
 

Cons

"The cost can be a bit high."
"I want to improve the deployment of cameras and surveillance infrastructure."
"Google came up with something called Cloud Spanner Emulator, which fails to work like the real product if I want to develop some code and run a database locally on my machine."
"The tool lacks to offer AI features."
"The tool needs to improve horizontal scaling."
"The purging of the data could be better."
"Google's technical support is good, but they tend to never reopen a case and to send us snippets from the publicly available documentation. It's not as helpful as you would expect, not just for Google Cloud SQL but for all of Google Cloud products."
"The most challenging part is dealing with legacy data from your old systems and migrating it into the new setup, but once you've completed the data migration, it becomes quite convenient to use."
"I would like to see better integration with all the different tools on the platform."
"I would like to see better availability of the product in different regions. It should also improve the security with encryption."
"To create a seamless data integration, the title integration of these databases with the data integration platforms is essential. This is what we would like to have in a future release."
"For data analysis, the AI area of the product has certain shortcomings where improvements are required."
"I am yet to explore a lot of features that are present in this solution. However, it would be good if more documentation is available for this solution. This would help us in preparing for the certification exam and understand it better. Currently, we don't have much documentation. We do the labs for 20 or 25 minutes, but we can't capture and download anything."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Price-wise, I heard that Google Cloud Spanner is on the higher side."
"It is expensive."
"The solution is expensive."
"Google Cloud Spanner is an expensive solution."
"The pricing is very much an important factor as to why we use this solution."
"The solution is affordable."
"It's really cheap. It wouldn't be more than, I believe it's around 50 euro per month for running a cloud SQL."
"You need to pay extra costs for backup and replication."
"While the platform’s pricing may be higher, it aligns with industry standards, considering the quality of service and features provided."
"It is not expensive, especially considering the significant reduction in database management time."
"From a financial perspective, Google Cloud SQL is on the cheaper side."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
25%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Retailer
8%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
12%
Educational Organization
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise9
 

Questions from the Community

What is your primary use case for Google Cloud Spanner?
Google Cloud Spanner has all the features of a traditional relational database, including schemas, SQL queries, ACID transactions, and provides excellent integration and monitoring tools as well as...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Cloud Spanner?
Price-wise, I heard that Google Cloud Spanner is on the higher side. I am not sure if this is a rumor or if it's fake news, but I believe that having BigQuery and GCP together could be a little cos...
What do you like most about Google Cloud SQL?
The implementation part of the product was easy.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Cloud SQL?
The cost is expensive, especially for services like BigQuery, which charge based on query operations. We pay as we use, with no fixed cost.
What needs improvement with Google Cloud SQL?
Google Cloud SQL needs to improve its support for high-end I/O operations. On-prem systems with high I/O capabilities perform better, as Google Cloud SQL takes more time to handle the same tasks. T...
 

Also Known As

Google Spanner
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Streak, Optiva, Mixpanel
BeDataDriven, CodeFutures, Daffodil, GenieConnect, KiSSFLOW, LiveHive, SulAm_rica, Zync
Find out what your peers are saying about Google Cloud SQL vs. Google Cloud Spanner and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
867,676 professionals have used our research since 2012.