Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB vs PostgreSQL comparison

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 13, 2025

PostgreSQL and Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB compete in the database market with a focus on scalability and feature-rich infrastructures. Considering the strengths in scalability, Cosmos DB appears to have a slight edge, primarily due to its seamless Azure integration and auto-scaling capabilities.

Features: PostgreSQL is renowned for its extensive SQL standards support, ability to handle complex queries, and its diverse range of extensions. It offers comprehensive stored procedure capabilities and broad indexing solutions, making it a strong choice for scalable applications. Cosmos DB distinguishes itself as a multimodal NoSQL database with a focus on flexibility and integration with Azure services. It provides auto-scaling, geo-replication, and supports various data models for maximum versatility.

Room for Improvement: PostgreSQL users look for better query efficiency, improved GUI tools, and enhanced integrations and replication. Its complexity for new users and absence of certain SQL capabilities compared to other solutions are also seen as drawbacks. Cosmos DB could refine its cost management, provide better documentation, enhance advanced analytics, and improve cross-container querying to optimize performance.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: PostgreSQL is preferred for on-premises and hybrid cloud environments, although it requires significant technical knowledge and mostly relies on community support. Despite being open-source, a strong community underpins its usage. Conversely, Cosmos DB benefits from smooth deployment in Azure's public cloud, complete with robust integration in Azure's ecosystem and reliable, centralized technical support reflecting its managed service nature.

Pricing and ROI: PostgreSQL is open source, offering cost-free usage except for optional support or consulting fees, providing a fast ROI, especially valuable for startups and SMEs. Cosmos DB features flexible pricing that caters to enterprise needs but can be seen as costly due to its pay-as-you-go model. Its pricing necessitates careful planning to manage expenses effectively, but its reliability and extensive feature set justify the cost for larger enterprises.

To learn more, read our detailed Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB vs. PostgreSQL Report (Updated: July 2025).

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB vs. PostgreSQL

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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

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Ranking in Vector Databases

1st

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

101

Ranking in other categories

Database as a Service (DBaaS) (6th), NoSQL Databases (5th), Managed NoSQL Databases (1st)

PostgreSQL

Ranking in Vector Databases

12th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

125

Ranking in other categories

Open Source Databases (3rd)

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Vector Databases category, the mindshare of Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is 4.0%. The mindshare of PostgreSQL is 5.2%, up from 3.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Vector Databases

Featured Reviews

MichaelJohn

Director | Data & AI at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Very efficient for application-facing scenarios

There are several areas for improvement. Firstly, having a local development emulator or simulator for Azure Cosmos DB would be beneficial. It would be very handy to have a Docker container that developers can use locally. Although, I know there is a free tier and so on and so forth, having a local environment would be nice. For example, SQL Server is very portable. You can even install it on your machine. That is the number one thing that is missing in Azure Cosmos DB. The second improvement area is the IDE of choice. That means how you interact with Azure Cosmos DB. For example, with SQL Server, you have SQL Server Management Studio. I know there is a little bit of support for Azure Cosmos DB in Azure Data Studio, but it is not heavily advertised or it does not feel like first-class citizen support. Developer experience or developer tooling is missing in terms of interacting with the database. Better developer tools or an IDE for interacting with Azure Cosmos DB would enhance the developer experience. Lastly, there is some mixed messaging about what Azure Cosmos DB is, given its multiple APIs. There are so many Azure Cosmos DB APIs available. There is NoSQL. There are MongoDB, Gremlin, and others. There is still some mixed messaging for others who are new to Azure Cosmos DB about what Azure Cosmos DB is. Is this like MongoDB, but then there is also MongoDB in Azure Cosmos DB? I know it well, and I know that the default one is just NoSQL, but others I have interacted with over the last ten years or so get confused.

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PavithrarajShetty

Software Architect at Tetherfi

Offers simplicity and is cheaply priced

I haven't gone through the scalability aspect since I was using MySQL Server. I haven't worked to a high level in PostgreSQL, but with MySQL Server, I have managed clustering and partitioning. I think I haven't put much focus on PostgreSQL, so I am not sure how it behaves or how it works.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Cosmos DB is a pretty stable solution. I would rate it a ten out of ten."

"The searching capability is exceptional. It is very simple and incomparable to competitors."

"With Azure you can start small and grow as you need."

"Cosmos DB makes life easier because if we want to use Mongo-type data, or Cassandra-type data, or maybe even just a simple cable storage-type data, then graph, there are multiple ways to do this."

"The biggest benefit it offers is scalability. It's easier to work with concurrency and updating data."

"Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB has helped to improve efficiency, providing good response times and allowing the storage of AI process results, which is crucial for feedback loops."

"The most valuable features of Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB include the TTL, the ability to scale up and down as needed, and geo-replication, which comes out of the box."

"Their new feature, dynamic data masking, is very cool and useful for us."

More Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB pros

"The initial setup is quick and easy."

"Scalable, stable, and easy to manage database system, with a straightforward installation."

"It's a transactional database, so we use Postgres for most of our reporting. That's where it's helping."

"We managed to reduce the storage space needed to 10% of the original size, without affecting data integrity, and we significantly improved the performance."

"Clustering will be the number 1 feature. It is also open-source so it is free. It can also be clustered, to allow fault tolerance."

"The built-in code procedural language is the most valuable. It has a built-in layer for code procedures. Its installation is very easy and quick, and it is free. It is also stable, and its performance is also good."

"The solution is quite stable."

"PostgreSQL is stable. It's available, stable, and reliable."

Cons

"The model with autoscaling for RU is complicated to optimize RU consumption."

"Cosmos DB is expensive, and the RU-based pricing model is confusing."

"I would like to see Cosmos DB introduce a feature that would convert machine language to human-readable queries."

"For streaming platforms, Azure Cosmos DB could improve efficiency in data storage. Indexing can also be better. Enhanced capabilities are necessary to manage increased data amounts more effectively during searches."

"It doesn't support all databases."

"I hope they improve the service. Before last year, improvements on Cosmos DB were very slow."

"Its stability can be further improved."

"We are at the beginning of production, and everything is working very well. The price can always be lower, but currently, it's not a problem."

More Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB cons

"I have noticed that user and access management should be improved."

"I don't think PostgreSQL supports bulk databases, so it needs to have more capabilities in terms of managing the bulk data."

"The user interface could be a bit better."

"Sometimes, it becomes slow because of the network. So, there is room for improvement in performance."

"I had some issues when I integrated with the Jupyter Notebook."

"The solution could improve the integration."

"The scalability is limited."

"It is possible that in the newer version this has been addressed, but I would like the deployment in microservices architecture could be improved."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Its cost is transparent. Pricing depends on the transaction and data size, but overall, it is cheaper compared to hosting it on your corporate network due to other factors like power consumption."

"Cosmos DB's pricing structure has significantly improved in recent months, both in terms of its pricing model and how charges are calculated."

"With heavy use, like a large-scale IoT implementation, you could easily hit a quarter of a million dollars a month in Azure charges if Cosmos DB is a big part of it."

"Pricing, at times, is not super clear because they use the request unit (RU) model. To manage not just Azure Cosmos DB but what you are receiving for the dollars paid is not easy. It is very abstract. They could do a better job of connecting Azure Cosmos DB with the value or some variation of that."

"The pricing is perceived as being on the higher side. However, if you have large data operations, it might reduce costs due to performance efficiencies."

"From a startup point of view, it appears to be expensive. If I were to create my startup, it would not have the pricing appeal compared to the competition, such as Supabase. All those other databases are well-advertised by communities. I know there is a free tier with Azure Cosmos DB. It is just not well advertised."

"Microsoft provides fair pricing."

"Its price is in the middle, neither too low nor too high."

More Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB pricing and cost advice

"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."

"There is an annual license."

"The tool is cheaply priced compared to other RDBMS providers in the market."

"Our company pays for it. There are free versions available, but for advanced features, you obviously have to pay."

"It could be much cheaper. If you would like to build an application on Amazon today, PostgreSQL is the standard database with Redshift. If you want other databases, you can add them, but PostgreSQL is the basis of everything. It's a question of money, that's it."

"It is free. There is no license on it."

"Affordable solution."

"This solution can offer a cheaper choice for customers since it is open-source."

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Legal Firm

13%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Computer Software Company

15%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

The initial setup is simple and straightforward. You can set up a Cosmos DB in a day, even configuring things like availability zones around the world.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

Pricing is a complex process at the enterprise level. While I'm not handling the pricing directly, through stakeholder meetings and conversations, we understood that having everything in a single p...

What needs improvement with Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

The only area Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB can improve on is its documentation; while it is solid and very useful, enhancements in the indexing documentation would help users save costs and make it mo...

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.

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Product Reports

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB

Download Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB product report

Download PostgreSQL product report

Also Known As

Microsoft Azure DocumentDB, MS Azure Cosmos DB

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Overview

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB is a globally distributed, multi-model database service providing scalability, user-friendliness, and seamless integration, suitable for managing large volumes of structured and unstructured data across diverse applications.

Azure Cosmos DB is renowned for its scalability, stability, and ease of integration, offering robust support for multiple data models and APIs. Its capacity for handling unstructured data efficiently and providing real-time analytics makes it ideal for applications requiring high performance and global distribution. With features like automatic failover and integration with Microsoft products, users benefit from cost optimization and secure data handling. Enhancement opportunities include simplifying queries, improving documentation, and expanding backup and analytics functionalities.

What are the most important features of Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB?

Scalability and Autoscaling: Efficiently handles growing data and user demands.
Multi-Model Support: Adapts to different data models seamlessly.
Global Distribution: Provides low-latency access across multiple regions.
Automatic Failover: Ensures high availability and reliability.
Integration with Microsoft Products: Offers seamless connectivity with Azure services.

What benefits should users look for in Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB reviews?

Performance and Speed: Exceptionally fast processing for real-time data analytics.
Cost Optimization: Tools for managing expenses effectively.
Secure Data Handling: Implements strong data security measures.
Flexible Data Ingestion: Supports diverse data ingestion methods.

Azure Cosmos DB is frequently used in sectors like web, mobile, IoT, and analytics. It supports applications as a key-value store, processes real-time data, and enables global scalability with low-latency access. Its big data management capabilities and integration with Azure services enhance its utility across industries.

Microsoft

PostgreSQL is a versatile and reliable database management system commonly used for web development, data analysis, and building scalable databases.

It offers advanced features like indexing, replication, and transaction management. Users appreciate its flexibility, performance, and ability to handle large amounts of data efficiently. Its robustness, scalability, and support for complex queries make it highly valuable.

Additionally, PostgreSQL's extensibility, flexibility, community support, and frequent updates contribute to its ongoing improvement and stability.

Sample Customers

TomTom, KPMG Australia, Bosch, ASOS, Mercedes Benz, NBA, Zero Friction, Nederlandse Spoorwegen, Kinectify

1. Apple 2. Cisco 3. Fujitsu 4. Instagram 5. Netflix 6. Red Hat 7. Sony 8. Uber 9. Cisco Systems 10. Skype 11. LinkedIn 12. Etsy 13. Yelp 14. Reddit 15. Dropbox 16. Slack 17. Twitch 18. WhatsApp 19. Snapchat 20. Shazam 21. SoundCloud 22. The New York Times 23. Cisco WebEx 24. Atlassian 25. Cisco Meraki 26. Heroku 27. GitLab 28. Zalando 29. OpenTable 30. Trello 31. Square Enix 32. Bloomberg

Microsoft Azure Cosmos DB vs. PostgreSQL