# Prometheus vs QuestDB

**Leader by vioscaleAI score:** Prometheus

| Attribute | Prometheus | QuestDB |
|---|---|---|
| **vioscaleAI score** | 66.8 (57% (medium)) | 49.9 (70% (medium)) |
| activity.commits_last_30d | 100 | 38 |
| adoption.dependent_repos | 5,467 | 106 |
| adoption.github_stars | 66,366 | 17,444 |
| adoption.package_downloads_weekly | 11,748,542 | - |
| content.faq | `[{"answer":"A systems monitoring platform that collects metrics from configured targets at regular intervals, evaluates alert rules using PromQL, and triggers notifications. It uses a dimensional data model with key-value labels for flexible metric analysis and dashboarding. It is indexed under Time-Series Databases.","source":"https://prometheus.io","question":"What is Prometheus?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Prometheus is open source, so it can be self-hosted and used at no licence cost. It is released under the Apache-2.0 licence. Pricing changes often, so verify at source before relying on it.","source":"https://prometheus.io","question":"Is Prometheus free to use?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Prometheus supports Windows, macOS, Linux and a command-line interface. Platforms we have not confirmed are simply not listed here rather than ruled out.","source":"https://prometheus.io","question":"What platforms does Prometheus support?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Yes. Prometheus can be deployed on-premise and self-hosted, so it does not have to run on the vendor's infrastructure.","source":"https://prometheus.io","question":"Can Prometheus be self-hosted?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have confirmed 24 integrations for Prometheus, including Amazon SNS, Discord, incident.io, Jira, Mattermost, Microsoft Teams, OpsGenie and PagerDuty, plus 16 more. This is what we could verify from public sources, so the vendor may support others we have not indexed.","source":"https://prometheus.io","question":"What does Prometheus integrate with?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have independently confirmed GDPR for Prometheus. Certifications we do not list are ones we have not been able to verify from public sources, which is not the same as Prometheus not holding them. Always confirm compliance directly before you rely on it.","source":"https://prometheus.io/docs/operating/security/","question":"What security certifications does Prometheus have?","confidence":0.7},{"answer":"Yes. Prometheus is published under the Apache-2.0 licence, a permissive licence that generally allows commercial use and modification. Licence terms can change between releases, so verify against the repository for the version you intend to use.","source":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus","question":"Is Prometheus open source?","confidence":0.99}]` | `[{"answer":"QuestDB is an open-source time-series database engineered for low latency, delivering ultra-low latency ingestion, high throughput, and multi-tier storage for demanding time-series workloads. It is indexed under Time-Series Databases.","source":"https://questdb.io","question":"What is QuestDB?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"QuestDB offers a free tier, so you can start without paying. Pricing changes often, so verify at source before relying on it.","source":"https://questdb.com/glossary/black-scholes-model-for-option-pricing/","question":"Is QuestDB free?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"QuestDB supports the web and a command-line interface. Platforms we have not confirmed are simply not listed here rather than ruled out.","source":"https://questdb.com/glossary/black-scholes-model-for-option-pricing/","question":"What platforms does QuestDB support?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"Yes. QuestDB can be deployed cloud / SaaS and self-hosted, so it does not have to run on the vendor's infrastructure.","source":"https://questdb.com/glossary/black-scholes-model-for-option-pricing/","question":"Can QuestDB be self-hosted?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have confirmed 10 integrations for QuestDB, including PostgreSQL, Parquet, Arrow, Polars, Pandas, Debezium, Iceberg and MySQL, plus 2 more. This is what we could verify from public sources, so the vendor may support others we have not indexed.","source":"https://questdb.com/glossary/black-scholes-model-for-option-pricing/","question":"What does QuestDB integrate with?","confidence":0.6},{"answer":"We have independently confirmed SOC 2 and GDPR for QuestDB. Certifications we do not list are ones we have not been able to verify from public sources, which is not the same as QuestDB not holding them. Always confirm compliance directly before you rely on it.","source":"https://questdb.io","question":"What security certifications does QuestDB have?","confidence":0.48},{"answer":"Yes. QuestDB is published under the Apache-2.0 licence, a permissive licence that generally allows commercial use and modification. Licence terms can change between releases, so verify against the repository for the version you intend to use.","source":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb","question":"Is QuestDB open source?","confidence":0.95},{"answer":"QuestDB is available worldwide. Its primary markets are the United Kingdom and the United States. The vendor is headquartered in the United Kingdom.","source":"https://questdb.com/glossary/black-scholes-model-for-option-pricing/","question":"Where is QuestDB available?","confidence":0.75}]` |
| deployment.options | `{"on_prem":true,"self_hosted":true}` | `{"cloud":true,"hybrid":true,"self_hosted":true}` |
| description.long | A pull-based monitoring platform that periodically scrapes metrics from instrumented targets over HTTP and stores them in a time-series database. It provides PromQL for querying metrics and integrates with Alertmanager for rule-based alerting and incident notifications. | A specialized database engineered to ingest high-volume time-series data at speed, execute queries with minimal latency, and maintain queryable history across tiered storage layers—combining standard SQL with open file formats for portability. |
| features.capabilities | `{"clustering":"distributed","data_model":"metrics","deployment":"self_hosted","compression":"XOR2 float chunk encoding","ingest_model":"both","licence_class":"permissive_oss","query_language":"PromQL","replication_ha":true,"high_cardinality":"strong","sql_compatibility":"non_sql","prometheus_remote_write":true}` | `{"clustering":"distributed","data_model":"events","deployment":"self_hosted","compression":"columnar with frame compression","downsampling":"continuous_aggregates","ingest_model":"push","licence_class":"permissive_oss","retention_ttl":"automatic","query_language":"SQL with time-series extensions (SAMPLE BY, ASOF, HORIZON JOIN, N-dimensional ar","replication_ha":true,"high_cardinality":"strong","sql_compatibility":"full_sql"}` |
| integrations.count | 60 | 7 |
| integrations.list | `[{"name":"Amazon SNS"},{"name":"Discord"},{"name":"incident.io"},{"name":"Jira"},{"name":"Mattermost"},{"name":"Microsoft Teams"},{"name":"OpsGenie"},{"name":"PagerDuty"},{"name":"Pushover"},{"name":"Rocket.Chat"},{"name":"Slack"},{"name":"Telegram"},{"name":"VictorOps"},{"name":"Webex"},{"name":"WeChat"},{"name":"Webhook"},{"name":"Email"},{"name":"WeChat Work","native":true,"category":"chat","direction":"outbound"},{"name":"Blackbox Exporter","native":true,"category":"monitoring","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"Consul","native":true,"category":"service_discovery","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"Graphite","native":true,"category":"metrics_collection","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"Memcached","native":true,"category":"metrics_collection","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"MySQL","native":true,"category":"metrics_collection","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"Node Exporter","native":true,"category":"metrics_collection","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"StatsD","native":true,"category":"metrics_collection","direction":"inbound"},{"name":"Grafana Mimir","category":"monitoring"},{"name":"Thanos","category":"monitoring"},{"name":"VictoriaMetrics","category":"monitoring"},{"name":"Splunk","category":"monitoring"},{"name":"New Relic","category":"monitoring"},{"name":"Sysdig Monitor","category":"monitoring"},{"name":"SignalFx","category":"monitoring"},{"name":"Wavefront","category":"monitoring"},{"name":"Instana","category":"monitoring"},{"name":"InfluxDB","category":"database"},{"name":"Elasticsearch","category":"database"},{"name":"CrateDB","category":"database"},{"name":"M3DB","category":"database"},{"name":"GreptimeDB","category":"database"},{"name":"OpenTSDB","category":"database"},{"name":"Cortex","category":"storage"},{"name":"AWS Timestream","category":"cloud"},{"name":"Azure Data Explorer","category":"cloud"},{"name":"Google BigQuery","category":"cloud"},{"name":"Google Cloud Spanner","category":"cloud"},{"name":"AppOptics","category":"monitoring"},{"name":"Kafka","category":"messaging"},{"name":"Kubernetes","native":true,"category":"infrastructure"},{"name":"Ansible Tower","category":"automation"},{"name":"All Quiet","category":"incident_management"},{"name":"Rootly","category":"incident_management"},{"name":"Parny","category":"incident_management"},{"name":"Better Uptime","category":"incident_management"},{"name":"Asana","category":"collaboration"},{"name":"Notion","category":"collaboration"},{"name":"Matrix","category":"chat"},{"name":"Zulip","category":"chat"},{"name":"AWS SNS","category":"notifications"},{"name":"Phabricator","category":"project_management"},{"name":"NetBox","category":"infrastructure"},{"name":"Fastly","category":"cdn"},{"name":"NS1","category":"dns"},{"name":"ElastiCache","category":"cloud"},{"name":"OpenObserve","category":"monitoring"},{"name":"Mezmo","category":"logging"}]` | `[{"name":"PostgreSQL"},{"name":"Parquet"},{"name":"Arrow"},{"name":"Polars"},{"name":"Pandas"},{"name":"Debezium"},{"name":"Iceberg"},{"name":"MySQL"},{"name":"MongoDB"},{"name":"Cassandra"},{"name":"Kafka","native":true,"direction":"inbound"},{"name":"Apache Parquet","native":true,"direction":"bidirectional"},{"name":"Apache Arrow","native":true,"direction":"bidirectional"},{"name":"Claude Code","native":true,"direction":"bidirectional"},{"name":"REST API","native":true,"direction":"bidirectional"},{"name":"Apache Iceberg","native":true},{"name":"Databricks","category":"data_platform"},{"name":"AWS","category":"cloud"},{"name":"Azure","category":"cloud"}]` |
| language.primary | Go | Java |
| license.spdx | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| market.availability | `{"primaryMarkets":[],"availabilityScope":"global","availableCountries":[],"notAvailableCountries":[]}` | `{"hqCountry":"GB","primaryMarkets":["GB","US"],"availabilityScope":"global","availableCountries":[],"notAvailableCountries":[]}` |
| platform.support | `{"cli":true,"mac":true,"web":true,"linux":true,"windows":true}` | `{"cli":true,"mac":true,"web":true,"linux":true,"windows":true}` |
| pricing | `{"type":"open_source","freeTier":true,"sourceUrl":"https://prometheus.io","retrievedAt":"2026-08-14T16:35:31.505Z"}` | `{"type":"hybrid","summary":"Open-source Apache 2.0 free tier; QuestDB Cloud and Enterprise plans available via contact/quote","freeTier":true,"sourceUrl":"https://questdb.com/glossary/black-scholes-model-for-option-pricing/","retrievedAt":"2026-08-14T16:37:07.614Z"}` |
| pricing.free_tier | yes | yes |
| pricing.model | open_source | freemium |
| pricing.price_level | free | low |
| pricing.transparent | yes | no |
| release.cadence_days | 7 | 16 |
| release.history | `[{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.13.4","date":"2026-10-02T14:46:21Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.13.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.15.0","date":"2026-09-25T08:56:22Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.15.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.15.0-rc.1","date":"2026-09-22T10:07:36Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v3.15.0-rc.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.15.0-rc.0","date":"2026-09-14T19:17:49Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v3.15.0-rc.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.13.3","date":"2026-09-07T14:18:03Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.13.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.14.0","date":"2026-08-18T08:49:40Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.14.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.14.0-rc.0","date":"2026-08-11T11:05:32Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v3.14.0-rc.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.13.2","date":"2026-07-30T13:25:26Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.13.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.13.1","date":"2026-07-10T10:34:15Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.13.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.5.5","date":"2026-07-09T08:41:56Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.5.5"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.13.0","date":"2026-07-01T14:09:29Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.13.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.13.0-rc.1","date":"2026-06-22T16:45:27Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v3.13.0-rc.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.13.0-rc.0","date":"2026-07-09T08:16:34Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v3.13.0-rc.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.5.4","date":"2026-06-17T15:14:04Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.5.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.12.0","date":"2026-05-28T17:40:13Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.12.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.12.0-rc.0","date":"2026-05-19T10:46:20Z","type":"prerelease","version":"v3.12.0-rc.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.11.3","date":"2026-04-27T15:56:23Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.11.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.5.3","date":"2026-04-27T14:55:57Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.5.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.11.2","date":"2026-04-13T15:17:52Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.11.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/prometheus/prometheus/releases/tag/v3.5.2","date":"2026-04-13T15:17:26Z","type":"stable","version":"v3.5.2"}]` | `[{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/10.0.1","date":"2026-08-24T13:55:02Z","type":"stable","version":"10.0.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/10.0.0","date":"2026-08-06T15:36:51Z","type":"stable","version":"10.0.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.4.3","date":"2026-06-15T17:01:58Z","type":"stable","version":"9.4.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.4.2","date":"2026-06-09T13:30:03Z","type":"stable","version":"9.4.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.4.1","date":"2026-06-03T08:03:25Z","type":"stable","version":"9.4.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.4.0","date":"2026-05-18T12:56:56Z","type":"stable","version":"9.4.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.3.5","date":"2026-04-13T17:21:09Z","type":"stable","version":"9.3.5"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.3.4","date":"2026-03-26T16:16:42Z","type":"stable","version":"9.3.4"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.3.3","date":"2026-02-25T14:23:44Z","type":"stable","version":"9.3.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.3.2","date":"2026-01-28T15:23:29Z","type":"stable","version":"9.3.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.3.1","date":"2026-01-14T16:41:31Z","type":"stable","version":"9.3.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.3.0","date":"2026-01-09T13:08:40Z","type":"stable","version":"9.3.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.2.3","date":"2025-12-18T12:13:27Z","type":"stable","version":"9.2.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.2.2","date":"2025-12-01T12:48:30Z","type":"stable","version":"9.2.2"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.2.1","date":"2025-11-25T14:38:23Z","type":"stable","version":"9.2.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.2.0","date":"2025-11-13T16:13:27Z","type":"stable","version":"9.2.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.1.1","date":"2025-11-03T15:25:09Z","type":"stable","version":"9.1.1"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.1.0","date":"2025-10-03T13:54:02Z","type":"stable","version":"9.1.0"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.0.3","date":"2025-08-29T18:32:12Z","type":"stable","version":"9.0.3"},{"url":"https://github.com/questdb/questdb/releases/tag/9.0.2","date":"2025-08-15T16:34:55Z","type":"stable","version":"9.0.2"}]` |
| reliability.sla_pct | - | 99.9 |
| security.disclosure_policy | yes | - |
| security.gdpr | yes | yes |
| security.scorecard | 8.1 | 4.4 |
| security.soc2 | - | yes |
| security.trust_center | https://prometheus.io/docs/operating/security/ | - |
| security.vulnerabilities | `{"count":7,"source":"https://advisories.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/advisories?ecosystem=go&package_name=github.com%2Fprometheus%2Fprometheus&per_page=100","last_12m":4,"max_severity":"HIGH"}` | `{"count":0,"source":"https://advisories.ecosyste.ms/api/v1/advisories?ecosystem=maven&package_name=org.questdb%3Aquestdb&per_page=100","last_12m":0,"max_severity":null}` |

## Capabilities (Time-Series Databases)

| Capability | Prometheus | QuestDB |
|---|:--:|:--:|
| **Query** |  |  |
| Query language (SQL / PromQL / InfluxQL-Flux / Graphite) | PromQL | SQL with time-series extensions (SAMPLE BY, ASOF, HORIZON JOIN, N-dimensional ar |
| SQL compatibility | Non-SQL | Full SQL |
| **Ingest** |  |  |
| Ingest model | Both | Push |
| **Model** |  |  |
| Data model | Metrics (labels/tags) | Wide events |
| **Lifecycle** |  |  |
| Downsampling / rollups | - | Continuous aggregates |
| Retention / TTL | - | Automatic |
| **Storage** |  |  |
| Compression (columnar / delta / Gorilla) | XOR2 float chunk encoding | columnar with frame compression |
| **Performance** |  |  |
| High-cardinality handling | Strong | Strong |
| **Scale** |  |  |
| Clustering / horizontal scale | Distributed / sharded | Distributed / sharded |
| Replication / HA | ✓ | ✓ |
| **Deployment** |  |  |
| Deployment | Self-hosted | Self-hosted |
| **Interop** |  |  |
| Prometheus remote-write compatible | ✓ | - |
| **Licensing** |  |  |
| Licence class | Permissive OSS | Permissive OSS |

*Source: vioscaleAI. Generated 2026-10-18T01:46:23.332Z. "-" = undocumented, not absent.*