Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Elastic Search vs Faiss comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 5, 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

Elastic Search
Ranking in Vector Databases
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
90
Ranking in other categories
Indexing and Search (1st), Cloud Data Integration (6th), Search as a Service (1st)
Faiss
Ranking in Vector Databases
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
3.3
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
Open Source Databases (12th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Vector Databases category, the mindshare of Elastic Search is 4.0%, down from 6.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Faiss is 5.1%, down from 10.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Vector Databases Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Elastic Search4.0%
Faiss5.1%
Other90.9%
Vector Databases
 

Featured Reviews

Anurag Pal - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Lead at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees
Search and aggregations have transformed how I manage and visualize complex real estate data
Elastic Search consumes lots of memory. You have to provide the heap size a lot if you want the best out of it. The major problem is when a company wants to use Elastic Search but it is at a startup stage. At a startup stage, there is a lot of funds to consider. However, their use case is that they have to use a pretty significant amount of data. For that, it is very expensive. For example, if you take OLTP-based databases in the current scenario, such as ClickHouse or Iceberg, you can do it on 4GB RAM also. Elastic Search is for analytical records. You have to do the analytics on it. According to me, as far as I have seen, people will start moving from Elastic Search sooner or later. Why? Because it is expensive. Another thing is that there is an open source available for that, such as ClickHouse. Around 2014 and 2012, there was only one competitor at that time, which was Solr. But now, not only is Solr there, but you can take ClickHouse and you have Iceberg also. How are we going to compete with them? There is also a fork of Elastic Search that is OpenSearch. As far as I have seen in lots of articles I am reading, users are using it as the ELK stack for logs and analyzing logs. That is not the exact use case. It can do more than that if used correctly. But as it involves lots of cost, people are shifting from Elastic Search to other sources. When I am talking about pricing, it is not only the server pricing. It is the amount of memory it is using. The pricing is basically the heap Java, which is taking memory. That is the major problem happening here. If we have to run an MVP, a client comes to me and says, "Anurag, we need to do a proof of concept. Can we do it if I can pay a 4GB or 16GB expense?" How can I suggest to them that a minimum of 16GB is needed for Elastic Search so that your proof of concept will be proved? In that case, what I have to suggest from the beginning is to go with Cassandra or at the initial stage, go with PostgreSQL. The problem is the memory it is taking. That is the only thing.
Kalindu Sekarage - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Software Engineer
Integration improves accuracy and supports token-level embedding
The best features FAISS offers for my team include seamless integration with Colbert and the ability to use FAISS via the Ragatouille framework, which is tailor-made for using the Colbert model. Feature-wise, FAISS allows for more accurate result retrieval, and retrieval speed is also good when comparing the index size. Regarding features, I also emphasize that the usability of FAISS is very seamless, particularly its integration with Colbert and Ragatouille. FAISS has positively impacted my organization by helping us increase the accuracy of retrieval documents; when we store documents in token-level embedding, the accuracy will be high. Additionally, we do not need any external server to host FAISS, allowing us to integrate it with our backend framework, making it a very flexible framework.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The observability is the best available because it provides granular insights that identify reasons for defects."
"The solution is valuable for log analytics."
"I have found the sort capability of Elastic very useful for allowing us to find the information we need very quickly."
"The most valuable feature of Elasticsearch is its convenience in handling unstructured data."
"Gives us a more user-friendly, centralized solution (for those who just needed a quick glance, without being masters of sed and awk) as well as the ability to implement various mechanisms for machine-learning from our logs, and sending alerts for anomalies."
"The solution is stable and reliable."
"The flexibility and the support for diverse languages that it provides for searching the database are most valuable. We can use different languages to query the database."
"You have dashboards, it is visual, there are maps, you can create canvases. It's more visual than anything that I've ever used."
"The product has better performance and stability compared to one of its competitors."
"I used Faiss as a basic database."
 

Cons

"It should be easier to use. It has been getting better because many functions are pre-defined, but it still needs improvement."
"I would rate the stability a seven out of ten. We faced a few issues."
"I would like to see more integration for the solution with different platforms."
"It would be useful to include an assistant into Kibana for recommendations, advice, tutorials, or things that can help improve my daily work with Elastic Search."
"Machine learning on search needs improvement."
"The real-time search functionality is not operational due to its impact on system resources."
"Both the graph feature and the reporting feature are a little bit lacking. The alerting also needs to be improved."
"I have not been using the solution for many years to know exactly the improvements needed. However, they could simplify how the YML files have to be structured properly."
"It could be more accessible for handling larger data sets."
"It would be beneficial if I could set a parameter and see different query mechanisms being run."
"One of the drawbacks of Faiss is that it works only in-memory. If it could provide separate persistent storage without relying on in-memory, it would reduce the overhead."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is affordable."
"We are using the open-sourced version."
"The tool is an open-source product."
"The basic license is free, but it comes with a lot of features that aren't free. With a gold license, we get active directory integration. With a platinum license, we get alerting."
"​The pricing and license model are clear: node-based model."
"We are using the Community Edition because Elasticsearch's licensing model is not flexible or suitable for us. They ask for an annual subscription. We also got the development consultancy from Elasticsearch for 60 days or something like that, but they were just trying to do the same trick. That's why we didn't purchase it. We are just using the Community Edition."
"This is a free, open source software (FOSS) tool, which means no cost on the front-end. There are no free lunches in this world though. Technical skill to implement and support are costly on the back-end with ELK, whether you train/hire internally or go for premium services from Elastic."
"The pricing model is questionable and needs to be addressed because when you would like to have the security they charge per machine."
"It is an open-source tool."
"Faiss is an open-source solution."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Vector Databases solutions are best for your needs.
884,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Retailer
7%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business38
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise45
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about ELK Elasticsearch?
Logsign provides us with the capability to execute multiple queries according to our requirements. The indexing is very high, making it effective for storing and retrieving logs. The real-time anal...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ELK Elasticsearch?
On the subject of pricing, Elastic Search is very cost-efficient. You can host it on-premises, which would incur zero cost, or take it as a SaaS-based service, where the expenses remain minimal.
What needs improvement with ELK Elasticsearch?
From the UI point of view, we are using most probably Kibana, and I think they can do much better than that. That is something they can fine-tune a little bit, and then it will definitely be a good...
What do you like most about Faiss?
I used Faiss as a basic database.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Faiss?
I did not purchase FAISS through the AWS Marketplace because FAISS is an open-source product. My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing is straightforward, as there is no cost for acqui...
What needs improvement with Faiss?
I currently do not think there is anything to be improved based on our experience, as Faiss performs as we expected for our workflow. I would like to see improvement in the fact that FAISS currentl...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Elastic Enterprise Search, Swiftype, Elastic Cloud
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

T-Mobile, Adobe, Booking.com, BMW, Telegraph Media Group, Cisco, Karbon, Deezer, NORBr, Labelbox, Fingerprint, Relativity, NHS Hospital, Met Office, Proximus, Go1, Mentat, Bluestone Analytics, Humanz, Hutch, Auchan, Sitecore, Linklaters, Socren, Infotrack, Pfizer, Engadget, Airbus, Grab, Vimeo, Ticketmaster, Asana, Twilio, Blizzard, Comcast, RWE and many others.
1. Facebook 2. Airbnb 3. Pinterest 4. Twitter 5. Microsoft 6. Uber 7. LinkedIn 8. Netflix 9. Spotify 10. Adobe 11. eBay 12. Dropbox 13. Yelp 14. Salesforce 15. IBM 16. Intel 17. Nvidia 18. Qualcomm 19. Samsung 20. Sony 21. Tencent 22. Alibaba 23. Baidu 24. JD.com 25. Rakuten 26. Zillow 27. Booking.com 28. Expedia 29. TripAdvisor 30. Rakuten 31. Rakuten Viber 32. Rakuten Ichiba
Find out what your peers are saying about Elastic Search vs. Faiss and other solutions. Updated: February 2026.
884,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.