---
title: MariaDB
slug: mariadb
url: "https://toolweight.com/options/mariadb"
homepage: "https://mariadb.org"
categories: sqlite-vs-postgres-vs-mysql
last_verified: 2026-07-01
license: CC-BY-4.0
---

# MariaDB

> GPL-only MySQL fork under a foundation, with Galera clustering and native vectors.

MariaDB was forked from MySQL 5.1 by its original authors after Oracle acquired Sun, and is stewarded by the MariaDB Foundation with MariaDB plc selling support. It stays broadly wire- and dialect-compatible while diverging where it wants to: bundled Galera synchronous clustering, pluggable storage engines such as ColumnStore and Spider, and native vector search shipped in the community server ahead of MySQL.

## Identity

|  |  |
| --- | --- |
| Name | MariaDB |
| Company | MariaDB Foundation |
| One-liner | GPL-only MySQL fork under a foundation, with Galera clustering and native vectors. |
| Site | https://mariadb.org |
| Docs | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/documentation/ |
| Repo | https://github.com/MariaDB/server |
| Founded | 2009 |
| Open source | Yes |
| Licence | GPL-2.0 |
| Brand | https://toolweight.com/vendors/MariaDB |
| Compared in | 1 |

## Where it is compared

### [Database engines](https://toolweight.com/compare/sqlite-vs-postgres-vs-mysql)
| Field | Value | Confidence | Verified | Source | Note |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Embedded or server | Both | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/mariadb-embedded-server/ | Primarily a server, but the libmariadbd embedded library still ships, unlike MySQL, which removed its equivalent. |
| Concurrency model | MVCC (undo log) | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/innodb/ | InnoDB by default, so the same undo-log versioning as MySQL. Aria and MyISAM behave differently and are not transactional. |
| Write concurrency | Concurrent writers (row-level) | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/innodb-lock-modes/ | - |
| Isolation levels | Read uncommitted, Read committed, Repeatable read, Serializable | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/set-transaction/ | Defaults to REPEATABLE READ, matching MySQL. |
| JSON support | Text functions only | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/json-data-type/ | JSON is an alias for LONGTEXT with a JSON_VALID check constraint. The functions are there; the binary storage and multi-valued indexes are not. |
| Full-text search | Built-in | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/full-text-indexes/ | FULLTEXT indexes on InnoDB and MyISAM; the Mroonga storage engine is the usual answer for serious CJK search. |
| Vector search | Native type + ANN index | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/vectors/ | A VECTOR type with an HNSW-derived approximate index, GA in the 11.8 LTS release and included in the community server, ahead of MySQL on both counts. |
| Type strictness | Static, coercing | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/sql-mode/ | Strict mode has been the default since 10.2.4, but as on MySQL it is a sql_mode setting rather than an engine guarantee. |
| ALTER TABLE | Moderate | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/alter-table/ | ALTER ONLINE and instant ADD COLUMN since 10.3; DDL is not rollback-able inside a transaction. |
| Max database size | 64 TB | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/innodb-limitations/ | 64 TiB per InnoDB tablespace at the default page size, inherited from the shared InnoDB lineage. |
| Replication | Built-in async + synchronous | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/galera-cluster/ | Binary-log replication plus Galera synchronous multi-primary clustering bundled since 10.1, no plugin purchase, no separate product. |
| PITR | ● | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/mariabackup/ | Mariabackup for hot physical backups, plus binlog replay to a point in time. |
| Online schema change | ● | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/alter-table/ | Native online ALTER, and gh-ost and pt-online-schema-change both work against it. |
| Connection model | Thread per connection | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/thread-pool-in-mariadb/ | A thread per connection by default, but unlike MySQL the thread pool is in the community server. |
| Default max conns | 151 | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/server-system-variables/ | - |
| Managed options | Amazon RDS, Google Cloud SQL, MariaDB SkySQL | Inferred | 2026-07-01 | - | Thinner than MySQL's. Several hosts advertising MariaDB compatibility are in fact running MySQL. |
| Ops burden | 3 | Inferred | 2026-07-01 | - | Same shape as MySQL. Galera moves it up a point if you run it, synchronous clustering brings flow control and split-brain to think about. |
| Extension ecosystem | 3 | Inferred | 2026-07-01 | - | Pluggable storage engines are a genuine differentiator: ColumnStore, Spider, Mroonga, CONNECT. Not comparable to Postgres extensions in breadth. |
| Client libraries | 4 | Inferred | 2026-07-01 | - | Mostly rides MySQL drivers, which works until it does not, authentication plugins and newer type support are where the divergence shows. |
| Migration tooling | 3 | Inferred | 2026-07-01 | - | MySQL tooling generally works, but MariaDB is rarely the tested target, so you find the gaps yourself. |
| GitHub stars | 6,000 | Community-reported | 2026-07-01 | https://github.com/MariaDB/server | Approximate. Unlike MySQL and Postgres, this is where development actually happens. |
| Positioning | The open source relational database, made by the original developers of MySQL. | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.org/ | - |
| Licence | GPL-2.0 | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.com/kb/en/mariadb-license/ | - |
| Embed in closed source | ◐ | Inferred | 2026-07-01 | - | The server is GPLv2 with no commercial alternative, so you cannot embed it in closed source. The LGPL client library means you can link a proprietary client, the opposite trade to MySQL's. |
| Governance | Foundation | Vendor-claimed | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.org/about/ | The MariaDB Foundation stewards the code and guarantees it stays open; MariaDB plc sells products and support around it. |
| First release | 2009-10-29 | Community-reported | 2026-07-01 | https://mariadb.org/about/ | MariaDB 5.1.38 beta, forked from MySQL 5.1 after Oracle's acquisition of Sun. |

**Verdict.** MySQL without Oracle, and increasingly not just that: Galera clustering in the box and native vector search shipped in the community server before MySQL's did. The cost is a smaller ecosystem and a slow compatibility drift that now genuinely matters when picking drivers and tools.

## Alternatives

- [DuckDB](https://toolweight.com/options/duckdb), In-process columnar analytics engine, SQLite's shape, a warehouse's execution model.
- [MySQL](https://toolweight.com/options/mysql), The relational server that ran the early web, now Oracle-stewarded and InnoDB-based.
- [PostgreSQL](https://toolweight.com/options/postgresql), MVCC relational server with the widest SQL surface and a deep extension ecosystem.
- [SQLite](https://toolweight.com/options/sqlite), Embedded SQL engine that runs inside your process, a file, not a server.

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