A Comparison between Characteristics of NoSQL Databases and Traditional Databases

Abstract

With the increasing popularity of NoSQL databases, the question arises if they have all characteristics of databases and can they be a real alternative to the relational databases in all application domains. This paper makes an attempt to systematize the most important characteristics of the traditional databases and then to analyze whether NoSQL databases have these characteristics. On this basis it is possible to draw a conclusion whether NoSQL databases have the necessary qualities to be called databases, or rather they are data stores with limited capabilities. The results of the comparison shows that none of the NoSQL DBMS under consideration covers more than 50% of the characteristics of the traditional databases so the use of the term "database" in respect of any one of them is not fully correct.