Types & Comparison between MySQL database Storage Engines

MySQL is an open source database and used by the most of the database administrator. It uses database storage engines as a handler to handle different MySQL database tables. There are several storage engines supported by MySQL like MyISAM, InnoDB, Merge, Memory, Archive, CSV, Example, Federated and many more. All of them have their own functionalities and characteristics.

What is the default storage engine? The point comes in your mind. If database administrators do not select the type of storage engine for the database then what is the default storage engine for the database. The answer is InnoDB. It is the default storage engine.

Applied For: After release MySQL 5.5, InnoDB will be the default storage engine.

How to Change Storage engine? A database administrator can change the storage engine for database from the pluggable storage engine. Pluggable storage engine gives users flexibility to select the best fit for their specific case.

InnoDB storage engine is the most used storage engine in comparison of other storage engine. It is used for financial systems, health care applications, telecommunications, retails built on MySQL database. This storage engine is structurally designed to handle transactional related applications that needs crash recovery, high response time, concurrency, and integrity.

Comparison between InnoDB & MyISAM Storage engine: Each storage engine has its own specific characteristic and benefits. Beyond the performance, there are various other factors that suggest for a particular storage engine.

Features	InnoDB	MyISAM
ACID Transactions	Yes	No
B-Tree Indexes	Yes	Yes
Crash Safe	Yes	No
Clustered Index	Yes	No
Storage Limits	64TB	256TB
Foreign Key Support	Yes	No
Full Text Search Indexes	No	Yes
Backup/Point-in-time Recovery	Yes	Yes
Data Cashes	Yes	No
Others

Note: I have tested all above comparison scenarios but there may be many more comparison between these two storage engines.

Summary: InnoDB is default and most used storage engine by MySQL database administrators. It offers efficient ACID transactional capabilities. Now database administrator can create application in the InnoDB storage engine without altering default configuration settings.

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