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Citus Data vs SQL Server comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 4, 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

Citus Data
Ranking in Relational Databases Tools
29th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SQL Server
Ranking in Relational Databases Tools
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
274
Ranking in other categories
Database Management Systems (DBMS) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Relational Databases Tools category, the mindshare of Citus Data is 2.2%, down from 2.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SQL Server is 10.6%, down from 17.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Relational Databases Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SQL Server10.6%
Citus Data2.2%
Other87.2%
Relational Databases Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Arucy Lionel - PeerSpot reviewer
Co-Founder at Afriziki
Efficiently handles high-traffic scenarios and compatible with PostgreSQL extensions, offering flexibility in database management
There are many areas of improvement , especially in terms of DDL query routing. Even though it's masterless, DDL queries need to be sent to the coordinator node. Also, setting up a multi-node environment could be more straightforward. Currently, setting up a multi-node environment is challenging. It's a bit tricky. Installation on each PostgreSQL node can lead to communication issues between nodes. An automatic rebalancing feature would be a significant improvement. Currently, I have to manually command the rebalance. It would be more convenient if it was rebalanced automatically. The dashboard and monitoring capabilities are good, but it would be helpful to have an integrated availability dashboard.
Peter Larsson - PeerSpot reviewer
Data Warehouse Lead at Resurs Bank AB (publ.)
Ledger and seamless integrations have strengthened trusted analytics and unified workloads
SQL Server's high availability and disaster recovery features work for supporting mission-critical applications, but there is much more to wish for. These features are not quite ready yet, although they do function. However, they could be significantly better. High availability and disaster recovery features should be improved in the next releases. I have noticed that everything could be improved or enhanced in the future, particularly temporal tables and window functions. Sometimes, I believe Microsoft releases features to stay ahead of competitors, but they do not make them feature-rich or feature-complete. They release something to be ahead of leaders and then seem to forget to maintain and upgrade them. I want Microsoft to pay more attention and be more mindful about the things they implement. It is fine to do a first release that works, but you cannot simply abandon it in the following years without service packs and improvements. You must continue to build on features rather than forgetting about them.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is competitive with Mongo, MySQL, and maybe even Oracle."
"You can use Citus Data to write complex scripts. I like its version upgrades and disaster recovery as well."
"It's very straightforward to implement the solution. It took us two days to set up everything."
"Its distributed processing capabilities are a standout feature. It requires minimal changes to get up and running if you already have a system on PostgreSQL. Citus can run in its natural state."
"SQL Server is an inexpensive solution. I recommend it if the project isn't sensitive. SQL is similar to Oracle and integrates well with tools in the cloud environment. The difference is that Oracle is for data solutions where there is replication and moderation."
"The pricing of the solution is okay. It's less expensive than Oracle, for example."
"The solution is very easy to use."
"SQL Server, generally speaking, is stable also in high transaction environments."
"This is a very affordable solution, which is why it's used so widely in the market."
"The columnstore index feature is useful for us, and we also use the integration services. It is also very stable."
"The replication feature, user interface, reporting services, and notification services are really good. They are providing SQL profiler and SQLCMD as their integrated software, so we don't find it difficult to integrate any of our third-party applications with MS SQL because all of them support MS SQL very clearly."
"The most valuable features for database management in SQL Server are SQL Server Management Studio and Visual Studio Code with its administration capabilities."
 

Cons

"More features in monitoring and the reporting could make it better."
"Citus Data needs to improve its stability. Do not consider this product if you have the budget. It is still developing and has a lot of issues."
"There are many areas of improvement , especially in terms of DDL query routing. Even though it's masterless, DDL queries need to be sent to the coordinator node. Also, setting up a multi-node environment could be more straightforward."
"The solution could improve by having better integration."
"I would not recommend this solution."
"They could improve the solution by allowing more portability between on-premise and the cloud."
"For each additional core feature you want to add to your DBMS edition, it is more money."
"Right now, the tool you use to query the system updates every month. It pesters you to update the Client every month when there is nothing new that you really need to add, but it is constantly pestering you."
"Indexing, execution plans, and the SQL Server Management Studio performance."
"SQL is a highly unstable server - there are patch updates on the Windows server every week, which is why we only use it for non-critical systems."
"The price could be better. In the next release, it would be better if the database was more easily extendable."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Citus Data is an open-source product."
"The licensing is on an annual basis."
"SQL Server's pricing has proven satisfactory for our market range."
"The price of SQL Server could be reduced, the license is expensive. We have an annual subscription."
"The price of SQL Server could be better in the African market. The licensing model needs to be improved, it is confusing."
"Since we are a cloud-based company, there is AWS pricing on top of the SQL Server pricing. The Enterprise Edition can typically sell from around $1000 dollars a month, which is not cheap. Then, there is an additional one-time Windows cost, based on the code, which can go anywhere from $30,000 to $40,000 for the license."
"The product is expensive."
"The price of the solution is very expensive. If I went with the cloud version of SQL a license would cost me approximately 11,000 Riyals per month."
"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Construction Company
12%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Financial Services Firm
39%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Construction Company
6%
Comms Service Provider
4%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business119
Midsize Enterprise60
Large Enterprise118
 

Questions from the Community

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Would you say the price of SQL Server is high compared to that of similar products?
SQL Server is fairly priced because it has various editions, depending on the number of users, servers, or core packs you are using. If you compare the product to others in this category, the price...
Has using SQL Server helped your organization in any way?
SQL Server has helped my organization through partitioning to distribute the workload, as it splits them up into smaller pieces so the machines can easily deal with it. However, this comes with a h...
Which authentication mode is best for SQL Server?
My company connects through SQL Server authentication. We have company Windows accounts, but we do not want to connect the two, out of security concerns and to keep things separated for our own pur...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Microsoft SQL Server, MSSQL, MS SQL
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Cloud Flare, Agari, Mix Rank, Heap
Microsoft SQL Server is used by businesses in every industry, including Great Western Bank, Aviva, the Volvo Car Corporation, BMW, Samsung, Principality Building Society, Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield, and the Catholic District School Board of Eastern Ontario.
Find out what your peers are saying about Citus Data vs. SQL Server and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
900,644 professionals have used our research since 2012.