IT Manager at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Top 5
Jul 16, 2026
To improve Percona Server, I recommend more marketing because many people in the MySQL world know it, but there is a need to let others know that instead of MySQL, they can use Percona Server to enhance their scale-out architectures.
Director of Project Services at a consultancy with 1-10 employees
Real User
Top 10
Jul 11, 2026
I think Percona Server can be improved in marketing. I have been dealing with Percona Server for 16 years, but most of the people that I know that use MySQL products do not know about it. I cannot think of anything technical I would ask them to change regarding needed improvements.
Percona Server seems great to me overall. If I had to think of any small area for improvement for Percona Server, it would be around the proxy story. When adding a proxy to manage traffic better, we first tried SQL Proxy, but it never really worked for us, which was unfortunate because SQL Proxy offers better optimizations for read performance. We did have success with HAProxy, but it works on a network level, while SQL Proxy was designed to be SQL-aware and distribute parts of the query across the database cluster. The performance gain we were hoping for with SQL Proxy did not materialize, so we remained on the network level with HAProxy. Databases can be finicky regarding the performance they need. We had some disk I/O latency issues, which led us to use different types of nodes in our Kubernetes cluster where we provisioned Percona Server explicitly. There is a lot of IOPS happening under the hood, and while I suspect the application was not very efficient, it was also challenging to identify that we were experiencing performance issues due to disk performance. It would be helpful to clarify the metrics related to disk I/O latency so we could understand where our bottlenecks are.
I believe it would be great to have tools to deploy Percona Server in Docker so that we can split a huge database server into many small servers, which are easier to maintain and delegate to junior administrators. I also think there should be more use cases and documentation on deploying in Kubernetes with real-life examples, as currently, the documentation is minimal, making it difficult in a production situation.
I would love to see the flashback in Percona MySQL or even in Percona PostgreSQL. It's available in Oracle, the flashback. In Oracle, there's the utility of a flashback. It stores all the information in the tables for a few days. That way, if I accidentally delete my records from the table or I need to check the value of a column or row two days back, I can. If Percona had flashback capabilities, it would be ideal. I would love to see training be easier to find. I had some complications finding the training that Percona provides. It is not displayed on the website. For example, if I want to train myself via a Percona expert through virtual files or through recorded videos or something like that, it's really difficult to find any sort of course. You have to email them first, and they will ask you whether it is for yourself or it is for the corporate sector. The course content should just be readily available and not hidden.
Percona Server is a MySQL alternative offering improved performance and scalability for databases used in demanding environments. It is tailored for companies requiring reliable data management, ensuring efficiency and flexibility in operations.Percona Server enhances MySQL with numerous features that boost database performance, making it suitable for large-scale deployments. Known for its ability to handle heavy workloads, users count on Percona Server to maintain operational consistency...
To improve Percona Server, I recommend more marketing because many people in the MySQL world know it, but there is a need to let others know that instead of MySQL, they can use Percona Server to enhance their scale-out architectures.
I think Percona Server can be improved in marketing. I have been dealing with Percona Server for 16 years, but most of the people that I know that use MySQL products do not know about it. I cannot think of anything technical I would ask them to change regarding needed improvements.
Percona Server seems great to me overall. If I had to think of any small area for improvement for Percona Server, it would be around the proxy story. When adding a proxy to manage traffic better, we first tried SQL Proxy, but it never really worked for us, which was unfortunate because SQL Proxy offers better optimizations for read performance. We did have success with HAProxy, but it works on a network level, while SQL Proxy was designed to be SQL-aware and distribute parts of the query across the database cluster. The performance gain we were hoping for with SQL Proxy did not materialize, so we remained on the network level with HAProxy. Databases can be finicky regarding the performance they need. We had some disk I/O latency issues, which led us to use different types of nodes in our Kubernetes cluster where we provisioned Percona Server explicitly. There is a lot of IOPS happening under the hood, and while I suspect the application was not very efficient, it was also challenging to identify that we were experiencing performance issues due to disk performance. It would be helpful to clarify the metrics related to disk I/O latency so we could understand where our bottlenecks are.
I believe it would be great to have tools to deploy Percona Server in Docker so that we can split a huge database server into many small servers, which are easier to maintain and delegate to junior administrators. I also think there should be more use cases and documentation on deploying in Kubernetes with real-life examples, as currently, the documentation is minimal, making it difficult in a production situation.
Percona Server could be improved by adding more advanced query fields, which would be very helpful.
More material would be helpful in understanding potential areas for improvement with Percona Server.
I would love to see the flashback in Percona MySQL or even in Percona PostgreSQL. It's available in Oracle, the flashback. In Oracle, there's the utility of a flashback. It stores all the information in the tables for a few days. That way, if I accidentally delete my records from the table or I need to check the value of a column or row two days back, I can. If Percona had flashback capabilities, it would be ideal. I would love to see training be easier to find. I had some complications finding the training that Percona provides. It is not displayed on the website. For example, if I want to train myself via a Percona expert through virtual files or through recorded videos or something like that, it's really difficult to find any sort of course. You have to email them first, and they will ask you whether it is for yourself or it is for the corporate sector. The course content should just be readily available and not hidden.