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Cassandra vs Vertica comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
NoSQL Databases (4th), Vector Databases (15th)
Vertica
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
86
Ranking in other categories
Data Warehouse (5th), Cloud Data Warehouse (11th)
 

Q&A Highlights

it_user1272297 - PeerSpot reviewer
Apr 19, 2020
 

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.
T Venkatesh - PeerSpot reviewer
Processes query faster through multiple systems simultaneously, but it could support different data types
We use the solution for various tasks, including preparing data marts and generating offers. It helps extract data based on rules from the policy team and provides insights to enhance business operations. We also analyze transactions to target customers and improve business performance 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 of Cassandra are its scaling capabilities and its non-SQL nature capabilities."
"A consistent solution."
"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."
"I am satisfied with the performance."
"The time series data was one of the best features along with auto publishing."
"Cassandra is good. It's better than CouchDB, and we are using it in parallel with CouchDB. Cassandra looks better and is more user-friendly."
"Since I haven't had years of experience with it, it's still new to me. One valuable feature is its distribution, so I can run it partly in the cloud and part on-prem. That's a feature I'd like to use but haven't yet because we're trying to move to Azure. I don't know if or when that will happen. Ideally, we'd have it distributed over the cloud and on-prem simultaneously, so if something happens to our on-prem, we can keep going in the cloud, like a pay-as-you-go model with Azure."
"Vertica is a columnar database where the query performance is extremely fast and it can be used for real-time integrations for API and other applications. The solution requires zero maintenance which is helpful."
"The hardware usage and speed has been the most valuable feature of this solution. It is very fast and has saved us a lot of money."
"Vertica is a great product because customers can compress and code data. The infrastructure that data warehouse solutions need is a commodity server so that customers don't have to invest in infrastructure."
"Vertica is a columnar database, this support our developments in analytics, advanced analytics, and ETL process with large sets of data."
"I like the projection feature, which increases query performance."
"The Vertica architecture means it can process/ingest data in parallel to reporting and analyzing because of its in-memory Write-Optimized Storage sitting alongside the analytics optimized Read-Optimized Storage."
"The extensibility and efficiency provided by their C++ SDK."
"DBAs don’t need to add a partition every month/quarter like with other DBs."
 

Cons

"We found some issues with the batch inserts when the data volume is large."
"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 initial setup of Cassandra can be difficult in the configuration. There might be a need to have assistance. The implementation process can six months for connecting to certain databases."
"There could be more integration, and it could be more user-friendly."
"The disc space is lacking. You need to free it up as you are working."
"Fine-tuning was a bit of a challenge."
"Depending upon our schema, we can't make ORDER BY or GROUP BY clauses in the product."
"It can be difficult to analyze what's going on inside of the database relative to other databases. It can also be difficult to troubleshoot sometimes."
"Vertica's native cloud support could be improved, and its installation could be made easier."
"Performance of management of metadata layer (database catalog) needs improvement. We still have to have smaller customers on PostgreSQL; Vertica cannot manage thousands of schemata."
"Limitations in group by projections is where I would like to see an improvement."
"It should provide a GUI interface for data management and tuning."
"The integration with AI has room for improvement."
"In our company, we have faced difficulties in scaling the solution for certain use cases."
"The geospatial functionality could be designed better."
"I have found that coding support could be simplified."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I don't have the specific numbers on pricing, but it was fairly priced."
"I use the tool's open-source version."
"We pay for a license."
"We are using the open-source version of Cassandra, the solution is free."
"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."
"Vertica is an expensive tool."
"The solution is free and we pay for the storage."
"The price is reasonable. We use a pay per license model. Firstly, you need to buy a license. After that, you mainly pay the annual support fee of around 20% or 25%. I think their prices are quite reasonable."
"The pricing for this solution is very reasonable compared to other vendors."
"I am aware that we have licensed it, but I have no knowledge of its cost."
"The pricing and licensing depend on the size of your environment and the zone where you want to implement."
"The pricing could improve, it is a little expensive."
"Start with license per 1TB. Starting from hundreds of TB there is unlimited licensing to be considered. Move historical data to HDFS/S3 which are significantly cheaper or even free."
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Answers from the Community

it_user1272297 - PeerSpot reviewer
Apr 19, 2020
Apr 19, 2020
I haven't used SQream personally. However, if you are only considering GPU based rdbms's please check the following https://hackernoon.com/which-gpu-database-is-right-for-me-6ceef6a17505
2 out of 4 answers
Russell Rothstein - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 27, 2020
Morten, the most popular comparisons of SQream can be found here: https://www.itcentralstation.com/products/sqream-db-alternatives-and-competitors The top ones include Cassandra, MemSQL, MongoDB, and Vertica.
reviewer1219965 - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 27, 2020
I haven't used SQream personally. However, if you are only considering GPU based rdbms's please check the following https://hackernoon.com/which-gpu-database-is-right-for-me-6ceef6a17505
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
21%
Computer Software Company
15%
Healthcare Company
5%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
20%
Computer Software Company
18%
Manufacturing Company
8%
University
4%
 

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?
Cassandra is very complex to manage. Sometimes, I need to involve a senior DevOps engineer if we encounter a problem. About a year ago, we were unable to recover data without help from a senior Dev...
What do you like most about Vertica?
Vertica is easy to use and provides really high performance, stability, and scalability.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Vertica?
The solution is relatively cost-effective. Pricing and licensing are reasonable compared to other solutions.
What needs improvement with Vertica?
The product could improve by adding support for a wider variety of data types and enhancing features to better compete with other databases.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Micro Focus Vertica, HPE Vertica, HPE Vertica on Demand
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

1. Apple 2. Netflix 3. Facebook 4. Instagram 5. Twitter 6. eBay 7. Spotify 8. Uber 9. Airbnb 10. Adobe 11. Cisco 12. IBM 13. Microsoft 14. Yahoo 15. Reddit 16. Pinterest 17. Salesforce 18. LinkedIn 19. Hulu 20. Airbnb 21. Walmart 22. Target 23. Sony 24. Intel 25. Cisco 26. HP 27. Oracle 28. SAP 29. GE 30. Siemens 31. Volkswagen 32. Toyota
Cerner, Game Show Network Game, Guess by Marciano, Supercell, Etsy, Nascar, Empirix, adMarketplace, and Cardlytics.
Find out what your peers are saying about Cassandra vs. Vertica and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.