Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

PlanetScale VS Dgraph

Compare PlanetScale VS Dgraph and see what are their differences

PlanetScale logo PlanetScale

The last database you'll ever need. Go from idea to IPO.

Dgraph logo Dgraph

A fast, distributed graph database with ACID transactions.
  • PlanetScale Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-10-15
  • Dgraph Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-05-02

PlanetScale features and specs

  • Scalability
    PlanetScale is designed for massive scale, leveraging the Vitess engine that powers YouTube. This makes it suitable for applications requiring high scalability for both read and write operations.
  • Global Distribution
    Offers multi-region deployment, ensuring low-latency access and higher availability, beneficial for globally distributed applications.
  • Serverless Approach
    The platform takes a serverless approach to database management, which means automatic scaling, less infrastructure to manage, and potential cost savings.
  • Branching and Sharding
    Supports database branching for isolated environments like development, testing, and production. It also supports sharding, which helps in distributing data across multiple nodes for better performance and reliability.
  • High Availability
    PlanetScale provides high availability with automated failover mechanisms, ensuring minimal downtime.
  • Strong Data Integrity
    Uses Vitess’s strong consistency models to ensure data integrity across distributed systems.
  • Developer Friendly
    Includes tools and features that make it easier for developers to manage, such as automatic migrations and simplified schema management.
  • Integration
    Can be easily integrated with various cloud service providers, making it flexible for different deployment environments.

Possible disadvantages of PlanetScale

  • Learning Curve
    The platform comes with a learning curve, especially for teams unfamiliar with Vitess or managing distributed databases.
  • Cost
    While it can offer cost savings in some areas, the pricing for large-scale deployments and multi-region setups can be relatively high.
  • Complexity of Advanced Features
    Advanced features like sharding and branching can add complexity to the database management operations.
  • Limited Ecosystem
    Compared to more established databases, the ecosystem and community around PlanetScale might be smaller, which can affect the availability of third-party tools and community support.
  • Vendor Lock-in
    Using a proprietary platform can lead to vendor lock-in, making it harder to switch to other database services if needed.
  • Early-stage Platform
    While promising, PlanetScale is relatively new compared to some other established database services, which means it may lack some maturity or have bugs that older platforms have ironed out.

Dgraph features and specs

  • High Performance
    Dgraph is optimized for high-throughput and low-latency scenarios, making it suitable for real-time applications with large datasets.
  • Horizontal Scalability
    Dgraph offers seamless horizontal scalability, allowing the system to expand across multiple nodes to handle increased workloads.
  • GraphQL Compatibility
    Dgraph provides native support for GraphQL, allowing developers to use a widely accepted query language with their graph database.
  • Distributed Architecture
    Being a distributed graph database, Dgraph ensures data replication and high availability across different geographical locations.
  • Strong Consistency
    Dgraph offers strong consistency guarantees, ensuring that all nodes see the same data at the same time, which is crucial for many applications.

Possible disadvantages of Dgraph

  • Complex Setup
    Setting up and managing Dgraph can be complex, especially for users not familiar with distributed systems.
  • Resource Intensive
    Running Dgraph in a production environment can be resource-intensive, requiring significant computational resources and memory.
  • Learning Curve
    For developers new to graph databases, there may be a steep learning curve compared to more traditional relational databases.
  • Limited Tooling Ecosystem
    Compared to some older graph databases, Dgraph's ecosystem, in terms of third-party tools and integrations, is not as mature.
  • Community Support
    As a relatively newer entrant in the database market, Dgraph may have less community-driven support compared to more established databases.

PlanetScale videos

PlanetScale Beta - Release Radar

More videos:

  • Review - Using PlanetScale (MySQL) with Next.js and Vercel!
  • Review - PlanetScale and Prisma: building in the cloud - Nick Van Wiggeren | Prisma Day 2021

Dgraph videos

Intro to Slash GraphQL from Dgraph

More videos:

  • Review - Getting started with Dgraph #5: Tweet graph, string indices, and keyword-based searching
  • Review - Graph Database: Intro to Dgraph's Query Language (2017)

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to PlanetScale and Dgraph)
Databases
80 80%
20% 20
Graph Databases
0 0%
100% 100
Developer Tools
84 84%
16% 16
Vitess
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

Share your experience with using PlanetScale and Dgraph. For example, how are they different and which one is better?
Log in or Post with

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, PlanetScale should be more popular than Dgraph. It has been mentiond 102 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

PlanetScale mentions (102)

  • Ask HN: What's the best free database provider out there?
    Https://planetscale.com/ would be a good bet. - Source: Hacker News / 22 days ago
  • List of 45 databases in the world
    PlanetScale — Serverless database platform built on MySQL and Vitess. - Source: dev.to / 10 months ago
  • Good alternatives to Heroku
    Planetscale - Directly from their website: "PlanetScale is a MySQL-compatible serverless database that brings you scale, performance, and reliability — without sacrificing developer experience.". - Source: dev.to / 12 months ago
  • MySQL or Top Alternatives in 2024 and How to Choose One
    PlanetScale is a MySQL-compatible database that offers scale, performance, and reliability, and many more powerful database features. Leveraging cloud-native architecture, PlanetScale enables organizations to deploy, manage, and scale MySQL-compatible databases with ease. With features such as automatic sharding, distributed transactions, and high availability, PlanetScale enables businesses to handle large... - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • Breaking the Myth: Scalable, Multi-Region, Low-Latency App Exists And Will Not Cost You A Kidney.
    For MySQL, we've got PlanetScale, and for PostgreSQL, there's Neon. - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
View more

Dgraph mentions (21)

  • List of 45 databases in the world
    Dgraph — Distributed, fast graph database. - Source: dev.to / 10 months ago
  • How to choose the right type of database
    Dgraph: A distributed and scalable graph database known for high performance. It's a good fit for large-scale graph processing, offering a GraphQL-like query language and gRPC API support. - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • Getting Started with Serverless Edge - Exploring the Options
    DGraph – A distributed GraphQL database with a graph backend. - Source: dev.to / over 2 years ago
  • Fluree DB - A datomic like database that I just discovered
    How does it compare to, say grakn (renamed https://vaticle.com/, I think?), or draph (https://dgraph.io/), or Ontotext's GraphDB (https://www.ontotext.com/products/graphdb/), or Datomic? Source: over 2 years ago
  • GKE with Consul Service Mesh
    Consul Connect service mesh has a higher memory footprint, so on a small cluster with e5-medium nodes (2 vCPUs, 4 GB memory), you will only be able to support a maximum of 6 side-car proxies. In order to get an application like Dgraph working, which will have 6 nodes (3 Dgraph Alpha pods and 3 Dgraph Zero pods) for high availability along with at least one client, a larger footprint with more robust Kubernetes... - Source: dev.to / over 2 years ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing PlanetScale and Dgraph, you can also consider the following products

Datahike - A durable datalog database adaptable for distribution.

neo4j - Meet Neo4j: The graph database platform powering today's mission-critical enterprise applications, including artificial intelligence, fraud detection and recommendations.

Valentina Server - Valentina Server is 3 in 1: Valentina DB Server / SQLite Server / Report Server

Hasura - Hasura is an open platform to build scalable app backends, offering a built-in database, search, user-management and more.

MarkLogic Server - MarkLogic Server is a multi-model database that has both NoSQL and trusted enterprise data management capabilities.

Azure Cosmos DB - NoSQL JSON database for rapid, iterative app development.