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Neon vs Prisma Postgres

Neon: Serverless Postgres with copy-on-write branching and scale-to-zero, now part of Databricks. Prisma Postgres: Serverless Postgres from the Prisma ORM team, on unikernels, billed per operation with no cold starts.

key differences

  • Licensing: Neon is open source (permissive) (Apache License 2.0 (storage engine)); Prisma Postgres is proprietary (Proprietary (managed service)).
  • Neon is built for larger datasets (≤ 10 TB) than Prisma Postgres (≤ 100 GB).
  • Only Neon has geospatial, change data capture, pub/sub, compression, time travel.

choose neon for

  • +Per-pull-request preview databases
  • +AI app builders and agents provisioning databases on demand
  • +SaaS with many small, mostly idle tenant databases
  • +Serverless and edge apps on Vercel or Cloudflare

best at · OLTP, Vector search, RAG

choose prisma-postgres for

  • +TypeScript apps built with Prisma ORM
  • +Side projects and startups needing quick Postgres
  • +Serverless functions on Vercel, Netlify or Cloudflare
  • +Many small databases for templates or AI-generated apps

best at · OLTP, Content

NeonServerless Postgres with copy-on-write branching and scale-to-zero, now part of Databricks.
Prisma PostgresServerless Postgres from the Prisma ORM team, on unikernels, billed per operation with no cold starts.
overview
Primary model
Relational
Relational
Also supports
Document, Vector, Spatial
Document
Type
Managed service
Managed service
Status
Active
Active
Developer
Databricks (Neon)
Prisma Data, Inc.
First release
2022
2025
Latest version
–
–
License
Open source (permissive)Apache License 2.0 (storage engine)
ProprietaryProprietary (managed service)
Free tier
✓
✓
popularity
WhichDB Score
30.4
14.6
Rank
#86
#228
GitHub stars
23.3K
–
Stack Overflow questions
5
–
scale & guarantees
Comfortable data size
Medium (≤ 10 TB)
Small (≤ 100 GB)
Horizontal scaling
None
None
Multi-region
None
None
ACID
Full
Full
Consistency
Strong
Strong
Schema
Strict
Strict
Architecture
Serverless, Shared storage, Primary replica
Serverless, Primary replica
deployment
Self-hosted
—
—
Vendor-managed cloud
✓
✓
Serverless
✓
✓
Embedded
—
—
Edge
—
—
Clouds
AWS, Azure, Vercel
–
capabilities
Transactions
✓
✓
Joins
✓
✓
Secondary indexes
✓
✓
Full-text search
✓
✓
Vector search
✓
✓
Geospatial
✓
—
JSON
✓
✓
Change data capture
✓
—
Triggers
✓
✓
Stored procedures
✓
✓
Materialized views
✓
✓
TTL / expiry
—
—
Pub/Sub
✓
—
Columnar storage
—
—
In-memory
—
—
Durable persistence
✓
✓
Compression
✓
—
Encryption at rest
✓
✓
Role-based access
✓
✓
Time travel
✓
—
Branching
✓
—
Online schema changes
—
—
Streaming ingest
—
—
Offline sync
—
—
Runs in WebAssembly
—
—
interfaces
Query languages
SQL, PL/pgSQL
SQL, PL/pgSQL
Client languages
JavaScript, Python, Go, Java, Rust, Ruby, PHP, C#
JavaScript, TypeScript, Python, Go, Java
Best for
OLTP, Vector search, RAG, Content
OLTP, Content
Add more to this comparisonNot sure either fits? Try smart match

Neon vs Prisma Postgres: FAQ

What is the difference between Neon and Prisma Postgres?

Neon: Serverless Postgres with copy-on-write branching and scale-to-zero, now part of Databricks. Prisma Postgres: Serverless Postgres from the Prisma ORM team, on unikernels, billed per operation with no cold starts. Licensing: Neon is open source (permissive) (Apache License 2.0 (storage engine)); Prisma Postgres is proprietary (Proprietary (managed service)). Neon is built for larger datasets (≤ 10 TB) than Prisma Postgres (≤ 100 GB). Only Neon has geospatial, change data capture, pub/sub, compression, time travel.

When should I choose Neon over Prisma Postgres?

Choose Neon for per-pull-request preview databases; AI app builders and agents provisioning databases on demand; and SaaS with many small, mostly idle tenant databases. Choose Prisma Postgres for TypeScript apps built with Prisma ORM; side projects and startups needing quick Postgres; and serverless functions on Vercel, Netlify or Cloudflare.

Is Neon or Prisma Postgres more popular?

Neon ranks #86 on the WhichDB Score (30.4/100) and Prisma Postgres ranks #228 (14.6/100). Popularity is not fit: check the requirements that matter for your project.

Are Neon and Prisma Postgres open source?

Yes. Neon is open source. License: Apache License 2.0 (storage engine). No. Prisma Postgres is proprietary, closed-source software.