MongoDB offers many advantages over traditional relational databases:
This article will detail each of those points to show you how your business can benefit from MongoDB.
MongoDB is much more than a database. It’s a complete developer data platform. With MongoDB Atlas, the cloud offering by MongoDB, you have access to a collection of services that all integrate nicely with your database. Amongst other things, you will have:
MongoDB’s document model allows virtually any data structure to be modeled and manipulated easily. MongoDB’s BSON data format, inspired by JSON, allows you to have objects in one collection with different sets of fields (say, a middle name on a user only when applicable, or region-specific information that only applies to some records).
MongoDB supports creating explicit schemas and validating data. This flexibility is an incredible asset when handling real-world data and changes in requirements or environment.
Most databases force you to use heavy wrappers, like ORMs (Object-Relational Mappers), to get data into Object form for use in programs. MongoDB’s decision to store and represent data in a document format means that you can access it from any language, in data structures that are native to that language (e.g., dictionaries in Python, objects in JavaScript, Maps in Java, etc.).
If you’re used to having to bring down your site or application in order to change the structure of your data, you’re in luck: MongoDB is designed for change.
We spend a lot of time and effort designing efficient processes and learning from our mistakes, but typically the database is slowing the whole thing down. There’s no downtime required to change schemas, and you can start writing new data to MongoDB at any time, without disrupting its operations.
What good is a database if you can’t find things inside it? MongoDB is designed to make data easy to access, and rarely to require joins or transactions, but when you need to do complex querying, it’s more than up to the task.
The MongoDB Query API allows you to query deep into documents, and even perform complex analytics pipelines with just a few lines of declarative code.
MongoDB is designed from the ground up to be a distributed database. Create clusters with real-time replication, and shard large or high-throughput collections across multiple clusters to sustain performance and scale horizontally.
Thanks to the document model used in MongoDB, information can be embedded inside a single document rather than relying on expensive join operations from traditional relational databases. This makes queries much faster, and returns all the necessary information in a single call to the database. If needed, you can perform a left outer join with the $lookup aggregation pipeline stage, which delivers similar performance to RDBMSs.
When it comes to write performance, MongoDB offers functionalities to insert and update multiple records at once with insertMany and updateMany. These two functions offer a significant performance boost when compared to batched writes in traditional databases.
With MongoDB Atlas, creating and setting up a MongoDB cluster is easier than ever. With just a few clicks in the intuitive UI, you can deploy a new forever-free instance. Within minutes, you will be able to connect to your database using the provided connection string.
If you want to run MongoDB on your own hardware, there are many ways to get started. You can install the community or enterprise version directly on a server. You can also create your own MongoDB container, or use a pre-built community one.
MongoDB offers multiple flexible approaches. When using the cloud-based MongoDB Atlas, you can choose an instance size that fits your current needs. You can also adjust your cluster to automatically scale when needed. This way, you keep your costs at a minimum, while still having the flexibility to handle sudden traffic bursts.
In addition to the flexible cost for dedicated clusters, you can now create Flex tier clusters on MongoDB Atlas. With Flex tier clusters, you get 5 GB of storage, and the cluster can scale to support up to 500 ops/second. These clusters also have a $30 upper limit on cost, making them ideal for workloads with unpredictable demand. For example, a new MVP or development environments.
When it comes to finding help, MongoDB’s got your back. MongoDB has an extensive documentation available, as well as a large collection of getting started tutorials on the documentation website. A community forum is also available for you to ask your questions.
If you want to learn more about how to use MongoDB, take a look at MongoDB University. MDBU offers a large collection of free courses that will teach you everything you need to know about MongoDB.
If you still can’t find an answer to your problem, MongoDB offers many support plans with MongoDB Enterprise and MongoDB Atlas paid tiers on a subscription model.
Using a document database offers many advantages over traditional relational databases:
MongoDB offer many advantages over other database products:
MongoDB has grown in popularity because it’s a tool built with developers in mind. It is easy to get started with MongoDB, and it offers many powerful features. It is also easy to install and manage, thanks to the fully automated cloud offering, MongoDB Atlas.