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Oracle Autonomous Data Warehouse vs Oracle Exadata 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

Oracle Autonomous Data Ware...
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Data Warehouse (11th)
Oracle Exadata
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
130
Ranking in other categories
Data Warehouse (2nd)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer1297710 - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Administrator at a manufacturing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Analytics and data security needs are met but optimization requires improvement
We are using Oracle Autonomous Data Warehouse for analytics in my company The solution is used for analytics and it works for our data security needs. We continue to use it with satisfaction. Optimization should be better. The SQLs are sometimes very slow. I also noticed that Java is not…
Prabir Kumar Kundu - PeerSpot reviewer
SR AVP–Presales Cloud & Platform Management Services at Path Infotech ltd
Has consistently delivered high performance and aligned security while evolving with AI-driven improvements
When discussing Oracle Exadata, the main thing is the specialized database appliance, the flash cache, and the engineered machine on the database for the database itself. Overall, all the features are useful and meaningful for any database like Oracle to run the Oracle database. Regarding Smart Scan technology, it is for better performance. If a customer cannot tune their applications, this will help them to run the database and run the application without any tuning itself. Oracle Exadata's advanced compression techniques have affected my customer's data storage efficiency positively, with the feature being great, but as of now, our customer is not using that. I find its security measures align with my customer's organization, as security is aligned as per the customer's requirement. It has helped optimize performance and cost.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is an extremely scalable solution since you can dynamically change the resources as some other cloud solutions."
"The product is easy to use."
"The solution has a self-backup, so you don't need a DBA (database administrator) to do a backup."
"With Oracle Autonomous Data Warehouse, things are much simpler. Creating a structure, initializing the servers, extending the servers, those are all things that are very, very easy. That's the main reason we use it."
"I really like the auto-tuning, auto-scaling, and the automatic load balancing and query tuning in the system."
"The performance and scalability are awesome."
"I loved the simplicity of loading the data and simply relying on the self-tuning capabilities of ADW."
"The solution is used for analytics and it works for our data security needs."
"The tool's performance is good."
"Oracle is easy to use for peripheral things, such as the data vault and the data firewall, data sync, and partitions. These are the features that give an edge to other databases."
"Compression is a great feature, where one can really save a lot of storage."
"Exadata with the In-Memory option is several levels about SAP HANA."
"The most valuable feature is storage offloading."
"I am satisfied with its functionalities and performance."
"The most valuable feature of Oracle Exadata is the storage available."
"The performance on the databases is good."
 

Cons

"There is a need for more storage to be allocated, but over a period of time, it becomes impossible to reduce it after using it."
"One of the major problem is creating custom tablespace. The ADB serverless option doesn't support custom tablespace creation, which could cause issues during on-premise database migration that requires specifically named tablespace. There should be an option to create customized tablespace."
"The installation process is complex. Oracle can make the installation process better."
"The solution could be improved by allowing for migration tools from other cloud services, including migration from Amazon Redshift, RDS, and Aurora."
"The setup is complex."
"A lot of the tools that were previously there have now been taken away."
"Ease of connectivity could be improved."
"The initial setup was pretty complex. It was not easy."
"There's room for improvement in terms of deployment, as it could be made faster and more user-friendly."
"Oracle Exadata could improve the monitoring system in the enterprise manager, it could be more user-friendly. In most Oracle tools there is a lot of functionality, and sometimes you need to do five or six clicks to find metrics, and sometimes it's a waste of time."
"In a future release, I would like to see some upgrade analysis advisors to help with a clear roadmap on steps that need to be taken and some of the automated processes."
"A room for improvement in Oracle Exadata is that it's not very easy to use in a microservices environment. It's not easy to split databases, and if this was easier to do in Oracle Exadata, it would make the solution better. What I'd like to see in the next release of Oracle Exadata is for it to become more modular, so you can use it in a context where the data layer is spread between many independent services."
"The initial setup process is very difficult and extremely complex."
"Exadata would be improved with single dashboard visibility."
"The price is also higher than I would prefer."
"I have found Oracle Exadata to be scalable. However, you have to purchase more hardware, such as memory."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price depends on the configuration we choose."
"You pay as you go, and you don't pay for services that you don't use."
"Oracle Autonomous Data Warehouse's pricing is fair and reasonable compared to the other cloud vendors."
"Cloud solutions are cheaper, but in the long run, they may not be much cheaper. They certainly have a lower initial cost. The licensing is yearly, and it is based on the size of the hardware and the number of users."
"We pay approximately $70,000 per month. The cost includes maintenance and support."
"The licensing cost of the product can vary since you can integrate it very easily with other products or other cloud products...You pay as you use it, so it is not yearly or monthly payments to be made toward Oracle."
"ROI is high."
"In terms of architecture and pricing structure, I feel it is a little bit costly compared to Azure. It's fine compared to RedShift, but compared to Azure, it's a bit pricey when you calculate for one TB storage plus around five hours of reporting with the frequency of 1TB data. The cost adds up, making Oracle a bit expensive."
"There is an annual license to use this solution. The solution is expensive."
"Exadata is an expensive tool, but, considering the ROI, it's worth going for the solution."
"The pricing of Oracle Exadata is too high."
"Our customers are always looking to reduce the license's cost."
"We pay for an annual license and it is expensive."
"The price of the solution has been expensive to implement."
"The majority of our customers are in government or big enterprises, and the projects that we sell come out to several million USD. With this amount of money on the table, it's always better to have an experienced team of consultants, who know Exadata very well, handle the implementation."
"You have to pay for the storage and the database in Oracle Exadata. It cost a lot, but it is worth it. It would be a benefit if we could reduce the price for the number of CPUs and extend the memory."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
11%
Media Company
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Insurance Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
27%
Computer Software Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Government
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise11
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business47
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise86
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Oracle Autonomous Data Warehouse?
We pay approximately $70,000 per month. The cost includes maintenance and support.
What needs improvement with Oracle Autonomous Data Warehouse?
Optimization should be better. The SQLs are sometimes very slow. I also noticed that Java is not supported, which is not ideal.
What is your primary use case for Oracle Autonomous Data Warehouse?
We are using Oracle Autonomous Data Warehouse for analytics in my company.
What do you like most about Oracle Exadata?
It is the best solution for OLTP and data warehousing.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Oracle Exadata?
I find its pricing reasonable and cost-effective for large organizations, but for smaller organizations, it may not be that useful.
What needs improvement with Oracle Exadata?
I believe that there is still room for improvement in Oracle Exadata, as they are putting AI features on those databases, which is making the database more user-friendly. Even you can talk to the d...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Hertz, TaylorMade Golf, Outront Media, Kingold, FSmart, Drop-Tank
PayPal, EBS, Organic Food Retailer, Garmin, University of Minnesota, Major Semiconductor Company, Deutsche Bank, Starwood, Ziraat Bank, SK Telecom, and P&G.
Find out what your peers are saying about Oracle Autonomous Data Warehouse vs. Oracle Exadata and other solutions. Updated: February 2026.
881,733 professionals have used our research since 2012.