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SQL Server vs Teradata comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 12, 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

SQL Server
Ranking in Relational Databases Tools
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
268
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Teradata
Ranking in Relational Databases Tools
7th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
76
Ranking in other categories
Customer Experience Management (6th), Backup and Recovery (20th), Data Integration (17th), Data Warehouse (3rd), BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (10th), Marketing Management (6th), Cloud Data Warehouse (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Relational Databases Tools category, the mindshare of SQL Server is 18.6%, down from 23.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Teradata is 5.5%, up from 5.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Relational Databases Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Azizul Haque - PeerSpot reviewer
It has eliminated all kinds of inconsistencies, and it is reliable, secure, and fast
I don't know whether SQL Server can support large organizations where the database size is more than 100 GB. It might be because of SQL Server, or it might be because of the programming of the software vendor, but a lot of people think that it is a problem with SQL Server. It can't handle a large amount of data or large data size. In terms of its usage, about 90% of our applications are running on the SQL Server database. We have around 1,600 users for our software, and all the applications are connected to the SQL Server database.
SurjitChoudhury - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers seamless integration capabilities and performance optimization features, including extensive indexing and advanced tuning capabilities
We created and constructed the warehouse. We used multiple loading processes like MultiLoad, FastLoad, and Teradata Pump. But those are loading processes, and Teradata is a powerful tool because if we consider older technologies, its architecture with nodes, virtual processes, and nodes is a unique concept. Later, other technologies like Informatica also adopted the concept of nodes from Informatica PowerCenter version 7.x. Previously, it was a client-server architecture, but later, it changed to the nodes concept. Like, we can have the database available 24/7, 365 days. If one node fails, other nodes can take care of it. Informatica adopted all those concepts when it changed its architecture. Even Oracle databases have since adapted their architecture to them. However, this particular Teradata company initially started with its own different type of architecture, which major companies later adopted. It has grown now, but initially, whatever query we sent it would be mapped into a particular component. After that, it goes to the virtual processor and down to the disk, where the actual physical data is loaded. So, in between, there's a map, which acts like a data dictionary. It also holds information about each piece of data, where it's loaded, and on which particular virtual processor or node the data resides. Because Teradata comes with a four-node architecture, or however many nodes we choose, the cost is determined by that initially. So, what type of data does each and every node hold? It's a shared-no architecture. So, whatever task is given to a virtual processor it will be processed. If there's a failure, then it will be taken care of by another virtual processor. Moreover, this solution has impacted the query time and data performance. In Teradata, there's a lot of joining, partitioning, and indexing of records. There are primary and secondary indexes, hash indexing, and other indexing processes. To improve query performance, we first analyze the query and tune it. If a join needs a secondary index, which plays a major role in filtering records, we might reconstruct that particular table with the secondary index. This tuning involves partitioning and indexing. We use these tools and technologies to fine-tune performance. When it comes to integration, tools like Informatica seamlessly connect with Teradata. We ensure the Teradata database is configured correctly in Informatica, including the proper hostname and properties for the load process. We didn't find any major complexity or issues with integration. But, these technologies are quite old now. With newer big data technologies, we've worked with a four-layer architecture, pulling data from Hadoop Lake to Teradata. We configure Teradata with the appropriate hostname and credentials, and use BTEQ queries to load data. Previously, we converted the data warehouse to a CLD model as per Teradata's standardized procedures, moving from an ETL to an EMT process. This allowed us to perform gap analysis on missing entities based on the model and retrieve them from the source system again. We found Teradata integration straightforward and compatible with other tools.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I like that it's a cloud solution, is simple to set up, and is simple to use."
"The security and vulnerability management are well-managed through the vendor."
"It is a stable product, and it runs seamlessly. It is not complex."
"The most valuable features are programmability and reliability."
"The product has been on the market for over 25 or 30 years. It's an extremely mature solution."
"Microsoft SQL Server is one of the better database administration software packages out there. It runs primarily on Windows Server platforms, but it can also run on Linux platforms."
"The backups are excellent."
"SQL Server has good performance. It is one of the best features."
"It's very mature from a technology perspective."
"It has a solid set of tools and consulting services."
"​Parallel processing features have helped to easily dump any size of data and retrieve data with great performance."
"The product's scalability is great. Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"Improved performance of ETL procedures, reporting."
"It's very, very fast"
"The initial setup was straightforward."
"Cuts time to process huge amounts of data with efficient analytical queries."
 

Cons

"The ability to connect with other environments needs to be improved."
"The tool's support needs to be improved."
"The pricing in general could be better."
"Microsoft doesn't have active-active load balancing scenarios. It's always a failover cluster."
"With so much data, things can get slow, which is why I would like to be able to understand how to better optimize queries."
"There should be more tools and documentation for tuning the performance of Microsoft SQL Server. It would be nice to have more tools for tuning because currently, all the tuning that we have to do with our databases is almost manual. We have to read a bunch of knowledge base articles, and this information should be better documented. Its free text search should also be improved. It is quite important for us. Currently, we're developing our own free text search because of the lacking flexibility in Microsoft SQL Server. Therefore, we're kind of using elastic search and making different implementations in order to reach our targets. Using just the native free text search of Microsoft SQL Server is not enough for us. It should have more flexible features as compared to the current version."
"The solution could improve by having better integration."
"The licensing is pretty expensive."
"Teradata's pricing is quite high compared to Redshift, Synapse, or GCP alternatives."
"Teradata is an expensive tool. Like, if you're already using Microsoft products like Windows, they'll market all their products together. And with the rise of cloud technologies, companies will adopt solutions that offer them some privileges or facilities. Similar to how SAP does it in the market, so do Microsoft and other companies. Even Oracle and other such tools are quite commonly seen compared to Teradata's competitors in everyday solutions."
"The solution could improve by having a cloud version or a cloud component. We have to use other solutions, such as Amazon AWS, Microsoft Azure, or Snowflake for the cloud."
"The scalability could be better. The on-premises solution is always more complicated to scale."
"The SQL Assistant is very basic. This tool can be improved for usability."
"It needs a teaching web site with more training on third-party tools used for BI."
"The solution is stable. However, there are times when we are using large amounts of data and we can see some latency issues."
"It's primarily designed for big projects and therefore, the pricing is pretty high. It's not suitable for smaller companies."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Licensing fees increase depending on size and performance. If you want higher performance, you should go for a different course."
"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."
"This is a downside of enterprise Microsoft products."
"It's a bit expensive."
"The free version is cumbersome to use and maintain. But $5000 for a licence is more expense than the benefit I would get from a licensed version. A licence might be worth the price to simplify management and speed up searches."
"The setup cost is high, but it will return every penny."
"Depending upon your usage, you can use the pay-as-you-go model for a short period of time. For longer projects, we can opt for one-year or a three-year license."
"​It has the easiest licensing."
"The price of Teradata is on the higher side, and I think that it where they lose out on some of their business."
"In this day and age, we want to get things done quickly. So, we go to the AWS Marketplace."
"It comes at a notably high cost for what it offers."
"The cost is significantly high."
"The price of Teradata is expensive. However, what they deliver they are outstanding. If you're looking for an inexpensive solution to run a database, this isn't your tool. It's the Ferrari of databases for data warehousing."
"Teradata is currently making improvements in this area."
"We are looking for a more flexible cost model for the next version that we use, whether it be cloud or on-premise."
"The tool costs about 30,000 euros a month, while Azure Synapse SQL only costs 10,000."
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Comparison Review

it_user232068 - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 5, 2015
Netezza vs. Teradata
Original published at https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/should-i-choose-net Two leading Massively Parallel Processing (MPP) architectures for Data Warehousing (DW) are IBM PureData System for Analytics (formerly Netezza) and Teradata. I thought talking about the similarities and differences…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
53%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
26%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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...
Comparing Teradata and Oracle Database, which product do you think is better and why?
I have spoken to my colleagues about this comparison and in our collective opinion, the reason why some people may declare Teradata better than Oracle is the pricing. Both solutions are quite simi...
Which companies use Teradata and who is it most suitable for?
Before my organization implemented this solution, we researched which big brands were using Teradata, so we knew if it would be compatible with our field. According to the product's site, the comp...
Is Teradata a difficult solution to work with?
Teradata is not a difficult product to work with, especially since they offer you technical support at all levels if you just ask. There are some features that may cause difficulties - for example,...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Microsoft SQL Server, MSSQL, MS SQL
IntelliFlex, Aster Data Map Reduce, , QueryGrid, Customer Interaction Manager, Digital Marketing Center, Data Mover, Data Stream Architecture
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

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.
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