PlanetScale vs Cockroach Labs
Cockroach Labs: Cockroach Labs offers a cloud-native distributed SQL database, a similar scaling job to PlanetScale's horizontal scaling.
PlanetScale
The MySQL-compatible serverless database
As of 13 November 2026, PlanetScale has a free plan and paid plans start at $15/month. PlanetScale is a MySQL-compatible serverless database platform that brings branching, non-blocking schema changes, and insights to database management. Softwr lists it under Databases. PlanetScale is made by PlanetScale Inc, launched in 2018, available on Web.
Overview
What PlanetScale does
PlanetScale is a MySQL-compatible serverless database platform that brings branching, non-blocking schema changes, and insights to database management.
What people use it for
- MySQL-compatible applications requiring horizontal scaling
- PostgreSQL deployments with custom cluster configurations
- Multi-region database deployments on AWS or GCP
- Applications requiring transparent sharding via Vitess
Related searches
The honest half
Where it falls short
Concrete and checkable, so you can decide whether any of them matter to you. This is the half of a review a vendor will not write about PlanetScale.
- Pricing varies significantly across 17+ AWS and GCP regions
- Additional costs for EBS storage beyond base tier, backup storage, and egress
- Dedicated PgBouncer and replicas incur separate charges
- Metal tier pricing increases sharply with larger configurations
Cross-shopped
What people choose instead of PlanetScale
Each pairing was judged by two reviewers asking whether a buyer would genuinely weigh the two against each other. The ones that failed were deleted rather than published.
PlanetScale vs PostgreSQL
PostgreSQL: PostgreSQL is the open source relational database PlanetScale also deploys, so a buyer could choose it over a managed service.
PlanetScale vs Amazon Aurora
Amazon Aurora: Amazon Aurora is a managed MySQL and PostgreSQL-compatible database, the same job as PlanetScale for MySQL-compatible apps.
Pricing
What PlanetScale costs
Taken from the vendor's own pricing page. Prices move, so check before you buy.
Postgres EBS Single-Node (ARM64 PS-5)
$5 /mo
- 512 MiB RAM
- Single-node configuration
- EBS storage included
Postgres EBS HA (ARM64 PS-5)
$15 /mo
- 512 MiB RAM
- 3-node high-availability setup
- 1 primary + 2 replicas
- EBS storage included
Postgres Metal (M-10)
$50 /mo
- 1/8 vCPU, 1 GiB RAM
- 3-node HA configuration
- 10 GiB NVMe storage included
Vitess Non-Metal 3-Node
$39 /mo
- Sharding-capable database
- x86-64 architecture
- 3-node configuration
Capabilities
Features
Database Branching
Non-blocking Schema Changes
Insights
Horizontal Scaling
Connection Pooling
Query Caching
Automatic Backups
Global Replication
Prisma
Integration with Prisma
Rails
Integration with Rails
Laravel
Integration with Laravel
Django
Integration with Django
Answered, with sources
Questions people ask
Each answer names the page it came from, so you can check it rather than take our word for it.
How much does a PlanetScale Postgres database cost per month?
PlanetScale Postgres pricing starts at $5/month for single-node ARM64 configurations with 512 MiB RAM and $15/month for the same specs in high-availability mode with 1 primary and 2 replicas. Metal tier starts at $50/month for M-10 configuration (1/8 vCPU, 1 GiB RAM). Exact pricing depends on cluster size, node architecture (ARM64 vs x86-64), storage configuration, and selected AWS/GCP region.
SourceIs there a free tier for PlanetScale?
PlanetScale offers a free tier for development and testing workloads. After free tier limits are reached, usage-based pricing applies starting at $5/month for the smallest Postgres single-node configuration, with costs scaling based on cluster size, compute, storage, and additional features like dedicated PgBouncer or replicas.
SourceWhat is the difference between PlanetScale ARM64 and x86-64 pricing?
ARM64 instances cost significantly less than x86-64 equivalents. For example, a Postgres EBS HA cluster with 512 MiB RAM costs $15/month on ARM64 but $39/month on x86-64. This pricing difference extends across all cluster sizes, with larger x86-64 configurations reaching up to $5,599/month compared to ARM64 alternatives.
SourceWhat is included in a PlanetScale cluster price versus additional costs?
The advertised cluster price covers the base compute and configured storage. Additional charges apply for EBS storage beyond the base allocation, backup storage, data egress, optional dedicated PgBouncer connections, and replicas beyond the base high-availability configuration. Regional pricing varies across 17+ AWS and GCP zones.
SourceBehind it
Who makes PlanetScale
- Company
- PlanetScale Inc
- Based in
- San Francisco, CA
Keep looking
Where to go from PlanetScale
- PlanetScale alternativesEvery product people weigh against it
- PlanetScale pricingPlans, floors and what the tiers exclude
- PlanetScale badgesWhich rules it meets, and the figure behind each
- All Databases softwareThe full category
- Best Databases softwareThe shortlist, and how it was cut
Best Databases software for
Compare PlanetScale with
- Amazon Aurora
- Nile
- Cockroach Labs
- PostgreSQL
- BigQuery
- MotherDuck
- FaunaDB
- DataGrip
- TiDB
- Readyset
- Xata
- Chroma
- Cloudinary
- Convex
- Dgraph
- Dragonfly
- Dremio
- DynamoDB
Other Databases software
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Free plan12 researched notesCross-platform database IDE from JetBrains for SQL and NoSQL databases
Free, then $8.25/mo12 researched notesApache 2.0 distributed SQL database with MySQL wire compatibility and a separate columnar replica for analytical queries.
Free plan12 researched notesDatabase caching and optimization that reduces infrastructure costs 30-70%
Free plan10 researched notesApache 2.0 platform for running many Postgres instances on Kubernetes, with copy-on-write branching and scale-to-zero.
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Free plan10 researched notesApache 2.0 distributed graph database written in Go, maintained by Hypermode, queried through GraphQL or its own DQL language.
Free plan10 researched notesHigh-performance Redis-compatible in-memory datastore with 25x better throughput
Free plan10 researched notesSQL query engine and lakehouse layer over Iceberg tables in object storage
Free, then $0.2/hour12 researched notesAWS-only managed key-value and document database with fixed per-partition throughput limits and no ad hoc queries.
Free, then $0.625/million writes10 researched notes
Softwr does not host reviews and shows no star rating for PlanetScale, because a rating we did not collect is not ours to publish. What is here is the pricing and platform detail from the vendor’s own pages, limitations we could state concretely, and alternatives a reviewer confirmed people weigh against it. Tell us if any of it is wrong.
More on PlanetScale
PlanetScale alternatives
What people switch to, and what they give up
PlanetScale pricing
Every tier, and where the cost actually lands
Compare PlanetScale
Put it head to head with anything we hold
PlanetScale badge
Its rating, and an embed for your own site
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