Global applications require databases that provide strong consistency, automatic sharding, and multi-region replication without sacrificing SQL compatibility. CockroachDB and YugabyteDB deliver distributed SQL capabilities that were previously only available through custom-built systems at companies like Google and Amazon.
Distributed SQL Architecture Comparison
CockroachDB implements a custom distributed storage layer inspired by Google Spanner, using a Raft consensus protocol for replication and serializable isolation by default. Its geo-partitioning capabilities allow pinning specific table rows to specific regions for data residency compliance while maintaining global query routing for other data.
YugabyteDB takes a different approach with a pluggable storage engine built on a modified RocksDB foundation, offering both PostgreSQL-compatible (YSQL) and Cassandra-compatible (YCQL) APIs. This dual API support enables organizations to consolidate both OLTP and wide-column workloads onto a single distributed database platform.
Both databases support automatic sharding, online schema changes, and follower reads for reducing cross-region read latency. For hosting providers, offering managed distributed SQL services enables customers to build globally consistent applications without the operational complexity of managing distributed database clusters themselves.