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Couchbase Capella vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database 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

Couchbase Capella
Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)
15th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Microsoft Azure SQL Database
Ranking in Database as a Service (DBaaS)
2nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
118
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Database as a Service (DBaaS) category, the mindshare of Couchbase Capella is 1.0%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Azure SQL Database is 14.7%, down from 18.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Database as a Service (DBaaS)
 

Featured Reviews

SupriyaKulkarni - PeerSpot reviewer
Good GUI, easy to learn, and simple to install
The architecture is complex. I do understand that. However, the GUI is very user-friendly. Sometimes all these things are a little difficult to understand for a person who is not experienced in Couchbase. There is a constant requirement to upgrade the versions. We need to constantly keep on upgrading the latest version for the newest one. Currently, we are dealing with an issue where some of the servers are on the 6.5 version, and a few have moved to 7.5. So we are in a mixed mode right now. We are having a high IO issue on our servers, which we are already dealing with. We have these cases with Couchbase, with Red Hat, et cetera. We feel like this constant need to upgrade is something that is very mundane yet a very difficult task. If you have three clusters, which have around thirty nodes, the data is quite sensitive. Whenever there is Couchbase upgrade that is going on, we see that our SR is dropped. The purchase rate and success rate drop. This affects our business and the clients. Rebalancing could be improved. I find it to be a very slow process when it comes to rebalancing the clusters. If you talk about other architectures like Oracle, they are pretty fast. Couchbase is a little slower. Rebalancing, taking the node out, doing the upgrade, putting it back, rebalancing it, is a very difficult and cumbersome. For Oracle, we have been running on version 19.5 for the past five years. There were absolutely no issues. Yet for Couchbase, every six months, we have to go do the upgrade.
Charley Hanania - PeerSpot reviewer
It is very easy to implement, manage, and offers great insights into what is happening inside the engine
Microsoft Azure SQL Database is integrated into other Azure capabilities and has a great foundation being on SQL Server with a long history of security, performance, and usability from a DBA perspective. Once you've set up a server, adding databases is easy. There's a minor challenge with having data in separate databases that you want to connect like we do on premises. I'm looking forward to using some of these new AI-driven functions that have come out around vectorization. Having the data closer to my transactional databases or data makes it easy to augment and enhance the Database and applications I currently use. It's great that Azure SQL now seamlessly integrates with Microsoft Fabric. It's a first-tier service in the cloud that connects to web applications and other databases. The data transformation orchestration capabilities within Database Factory and similar capabilities make it effortless to move that stuff forward.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The initial setup was straightforward."
"The way the nodes are managed is interesting."
"The solution effectively handles storing and maintaining information in databases."
"In terms of stability, because Microsoft is the underlying technology, they are much more stable than say Oracle. Since 2014 they did a great job in offering stability, performance and high visibility on the solution, especially in comparison to the other competitors."
"The data availability and speed are impressive, especially compared to legacy systems. The loading speeds are much faster on Azure SQL."
"The reason we moved to the cloud was for the convenience of not having any physical hardware to maintain."
"The most valuable aspect of SQL Azure is the SQL language itself. It's open and everybody can use it at my company. Also, we thought in the beginning that the response time would be inadequate, but it's actually decent. It's much better than expected. Then again, I'm not a programmer, but that's what I hear from our development team."
"Customers can benefit from a lot of cost savings if they go for Azure."
"The on-premise SQL Server licenses can be used since it is on Azure, so it's a significant savings for the customers."
"The stability is good and the performance is fantastic. Even when we try to do an inquiry into issues we can do it easily."
 

Cons

"The product could be improved by including a log section for tracking activities, enhancing database integration, and providing more transparency regarding pricing and monitoring activities."
"Rebalancing could be improved."
"Microsoft Azure SQL Database could improve by having better tooling in terms of connecting to other database platforms and better capabilities around programmable interfaces."
"The product could be more competitive in terms of features, security, and scalability."
"A potential area for improvement could be integrating with third-party clouds. Adding a feature to bring Azure SQL in Azure with SQL on-premises would be helpful."
"I think that the cost management in SQL is not clear because we may use some tax to identify products, but in some cases identifying the transactions in SQL is not easy for some financial cost centers."
"I need Microsoft to allow their network to access open source technologies."
"If the product could support applications requiring an SQL server for installation, by using SQL Azure as a backend, that would be useful."
"One area for improvement is setting up logs, especially for servers like VM SQL. It was also tricky to connect services on VNets to on-premise."
"The solution could improve by supporting more operating systems."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"There is no licensing cost for the solution."
"In terms of the cost, SQL Azure is a pay-per-use solution, particularly because it's a cloud subscription, so you pay as much as you use it."
"The solution is expensive."
"Microsoft services are costly, which is the only problem we face. So, pricing is an area of improvement."
"I'm not sure what the exact price is, but it's a moderate amount. It's not too expensive."
"I recommend considering a pay-as-you-go pricing model initially."
"It is expensive. Snowflake and PostgreSQL are cheaper than this. Google is also cheaper than Azure. Its licensing is on a pay-as-you-go basis. It is based on usage and storage."
"The pricing is flexible and can be adapted based on our requirements but the pricing options are complex especially if we are using a VM."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Retailer
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Couchbase Capella?
The architecture is complex. I do understand that. However, the GUI is very user-friendly. Sometimes all these things are a little difficult to understand for a person who is not experienced in Cou...
What is your primary use case for Couchbase Capella?
The solution is basically used to support our ordering system, which generates a huge number of orders for our customers.
What advice do you have for others considering Couchbase Capella?
We are Counchbase customers. Depending on your application, it is good to use Couchbase where you have high OLTP systems where you know there will be constant data loading, deleting, et cetera, hap...
What do you like most about SQL Azure?
The automated scalability feature of SQL Azure has proven to be highly beneficial, particularly when deployed in the cloud.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SQL Azure?
The pricing of Microsoft Azure SQL Database is not cheap, affecting user uptake. A gradual reduction in price could improve accessibility and user numbers, making it easier for users to adopt the s...
What needs improvement with SQL Azure?
I have used the Microsoft Azure SQL Database for two years now, and I don't find it satisfactory. It's slow and expensive. The Microsoft Azure SQL Database is not the latest version of Microsoft SQ...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
adnymics GmbH, LG CNS, Centrebet, netfabb GmbH, MedPlast, Accelera Solutions, Sochi Organizing Committee, realzeit GmbH
Find out what your peers are saying about Couchbase Capella vs. Microsoft Azure SQL Database and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.