Open Source Database Guide

Why use open source databases? Although the best open source database is largely going to be determined by the specific needs of the project and user, there are some general advantages of open source databases.

Zero Cost

Commercial databases can demand major up front and recurring costs for infrastructure, software licenses, and technical expertise before anything is developed or deployed. Commercial licenses generally cost more depending on which features or level of usage attach to them. In contrast, typically open source databases attach no license fees for either the database or its features.

Open Core

Some companies offer both OSS and enterprise database options with additional features and support. In such “open core” models, the foundational version or core of the product is free, but additional features require commercial licensing. This way, users can start by trialing the OSS version and easily move to the more robust, better-supported version when it’s time to go into production or scale their applications.

Database Extensions and Plugins

There are an impressive range of plugins and extensions available for many open source databases touching on integration, real-time monitoring, and custom data formats. Users can generally add them on to the standard database platform and configure them precisely as needed at no additional cost. However, some open source business models allow for additional commercial licenses — so-called dual licenses or multi-licensing — that may require an additional purchase to use additional features, extensions or plugins.

Community Support and Development

As described above, open source more broadly refers to source code that is available for users to deploy and modify as they choose. Yet it also refers to an ethos of an open source community and culture, with the developer and user community providing mutual support for their peers looking to modify or adopt the software for their own use. This itself can lead to a robust community of new product and feature development and free support.

As new business models emerge, open-source software is likely to exist that can take advantage of related new opportunities. In addition, since users customize their open-source databases in countless ways, the most popular open-source products are very flexible and benefit from massive user communities. These communities generate documentation, YouTube training videos, and Q&A forums with free open source database expert advice.

However, some open source contributors and communities maintain themselves by giving away the open source database code for free use, yet charging other users for application development, cloud hosted services, or technical services and support.