HSQLDB vs LadybugDB
HSQLDB
hsqldb.orgLadybugDB
ladybugdb.comSide by side
| Figure | HSQLDB | LadybugDB |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | $8.33/mo | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | Yes | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| iOS | — | Yes |
| Android | — | Yes |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 11 | 1 |
| Spec score · Embedded Databases | 9.2 (#2) | 8.4 (#7) |
| Integrations | The project documents JDBC and ODBC connectivity and integration with OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice. | The documentation describes integrations with Snowflake and PostgreSQL, and attaching to DuckDB, SQLite, Iceberg, Delta Lake, and Unity Catalog sources. |
| License | HSQLDB source and binaries use permissive BSD-based licenses, with separate terms for legacy Hypersonic SQL code. | All source code and precompiled binaries are distributed under the MIT License. |
| Product | HSQLDB is a Java-based relational database engine with in-memory and disk-based tables, supporting embedded and server modes. | Ladybug is an embedded graph database optimized for complex analytical workloads on very large graphs. |
| Support | Support options include a help forum, a user mailing list, bug and feature request trackers, paid SupportWare, and professional commercial support. | The site lists community support and says commercial enterprise support contracts are available. |
| Transactions | The engine supports lock-based and MVCC transaction models and is fully multithreaded. | Ladybug supports serializable ACID transactions. |
Plans
HSQLDB
- Developer subscription$100 a year
- Basic Corporate subscriptionPrice not published
- Premier Corporate subscription$2,500 a year
- HSQLDBFree
- HSQLDB softwareFree
- Developer SupportWare$100 a year
- SupportWare Developer subscription$100 a year
- Basic Corporate SupportWare$500 a year
- SupportWare Basic Corporate subscription$500 a year
- Premier Corporate SupportWare$2,500 a year
In their own words
HSQLDB
HSQLDB is a Java-based relational database engine for embedded or server use, with both in-memory and disk-based tables. It supports SQL:2023 core features and many optional features, plus lock-based and MVCC transaction models; the engine is fully multithreaded. Listed capabilities include JSON constructor functions, CSV loading and unloading, temporal system-versioned tables, row-level access control, and log-based replica synchronization. It includes a command-line SQL tool and simple GUI query tools. The latest official release listed is version 2.7.4, compatible with JDK 8 and above, and packages include Java 11 module jars as well as Java 8 jars for HSQLDB and SQL Tool. HSQLDB is self-hosted, with high availability, read replicas, and JSON data support listed. Its default combined limit for CACHED tables is 8TB, extendable to 256TB with a connection property; each TEXT table is limited to 256GB, and memory tables depend on available memory. The software is free to use in commercial products when license terms are met; its licenses are based on the new BSD License. The HSQLDB plan is free. A Developer subscription is $100 a year; Premier Corporate is $2,500 a year at the base level. Support options include community channels and paid commercial support.
LadybugDB
LadybugDB is an embedded columnar graph database for analytical workloads and agentic applications. It uses Cypher with a structured property graph model and can run on disk or in memory; in-memory data is lost when the process ends. Its query engine uses columnar disk storage, vectorized and factorized processing, multi-core parallelism, and join algorithms. Transactions are atomic, durable, and serializable. The project distributes source code and precompiled binaries under the MIT License, which permits commercial and proprietary applications. Imports support Parquet, CSV, JSON, NumPy, Pandas or Polars DataFrames, and PyArrow Tables. Official client APIs are listed for Python, Node.js, Java, Rust, Go, Swift, C, and C++, alongside a command-line interface. Ladybug Explorer provides a browser-based way to query and visualize a database, and the MCP Server exposes a database to LLMs and agents. Extensions cover sources and systems including Azure storage, Delta Lake, DuckDB, Iceberg, PostgreSQL, and vector similarity search. Concurrent access permits one read-write Database object or multiple read-only objects; multiple processes needing writes should use an API server pattern.