Comparison
MariaDB vs MySQL
Keep your MySQL skills, drivers and SQL. Move to a database with a growing core team, clustering, vector search and analytics you can run anywhere.
Oracle laid off most of its MySQL engineering, support and sales teams in 2025, while investment in MySQL or HeatWave has slowed. MySQL 8.0 also stopped getting patches in April 2026. MariaDB continues to deliver new features for a database you run anywhere.
Capabilities
How MariaDB and MySQL compare
Roadmap
Little new development for MySQL or HeatWave since the 2025 layoffs, versus a core team shipping new features in every release.
Clustering
MySQL Group Replication and single-primary by default, versus Galera Cluster with active-active, synchronous writes on every node.
Failover
MySQL Router reconnects, but in-flight transactions fail. MariaDB MaxScale replays them so the app keeps running.
Vector search
VECTOR data type with search functions is only available in HeatWave, versus native vector indexes and search in MariaDB Server.
Enterprise features
MySQL audit and firewall features require Enterprise Edition, while MariaDB includes auditing in the server and firewall filtering in MaxScale.
Keep your MySQL skills on a database that’s still being built
A drop-in path for MySQL apps
MariaDB speaks the MySQL protocol and SQL, so most apps, connectors and tools keep working. Our free assessment flags MySQL 8 features that need attention first.
HA that keeps transactions alive
Galera Cluster writes to every node at once, and MaxScale replays in-flight transactions during failover. Your app keeps running instead of retrying failed connections.
AI and analytics without HeatWave
Native vector search, ColumnStore and Exa run on premises or in any cloud, with new releases, while HeatWave development has largely stalled.
Recommended resources
Flightradar24
Flightradar24 moves from MySQL to MariaDB Cloud to track 25,000 flights in real time.
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Frequently asked questions
No. Oracle ended support for MySQL 8.0 on April 30, 2026, so it no longer gets security patches. You’ll need to test an upgrade either way, so now is a good time to evaluate MariaDB.
MariaDB uses the same protocol, SQL and connectors, and is a drop-in replacement for MySQL 5.7. Some MySQL 8 features differ, so you can run our free assessment to see what changes.
No. Your DBAs and developers keep the same SQL, client tools and drivers. Most of the work involves reviewing configuration and testing, and our migration tool helps with both.
HeatWave is Oracle's MySQL cloud service on OCI and AWS, with analytics, vector search and AutoML, but it gets little new development. MariaDB offers vector search, ColumnStore and Exa anywhere.
Yes. MariaDB Community Server is GPL open source. MariaDB Enterprise Platform adds hardened builds, MaxScale, Enterprise Manager, 24x7 support and up to 8 years of support per release.
Not hard. MariaDB Migrator automates schema, data, user and validation steps from a single launcher, and its replication mode cuts over with near-zero downtime.