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Google Cloud Memorystore

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by Google Cloud · since 2018 · also known as Memorystore, Memorystore for Valkey, Memorystore for Redis, Memorystore for Memcached

Google Cloud's managed in-memory family: Valkey, Redis, Redis Cluster and Memcached.

key-valuevectormanaged serviceproprietarymature
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Overview

Memorystore is Google Cloud's umbrella for managed caches: Memorystore for Valkey (Google's lead engine, with 9.0 as default and 9.1 in preview), Memorystore for Redis Cluster, the older single-node/standard Memorystore for Redis, and Memorystore for Memcached. The Valkey and Redis Cluster products offer zero-downtime scaling, Private Service Connect networking, persistence (RDB/AOF) and up to 99.99% SLA, and Valkey adds vector search. It is the default choice for GKE and Cloud Run apps that need a cache; cross-region options are limited to replicas and DR.

CachingSession storePub/Sub messagingVector search

Strengths & trade-offs

Strengths

  • +Managed Valkey with fast adoption of new Valkey releases
  • +Zero-downtime scaling for Valkey and Redis Cluster
  • +IAM auth and Private Service Connect networking
  • +Vector search on Memorystore for Valkey

Trade-offs

  • −Four overlapping products with different feature sets
  • −GCP-only
  • −Redis Cluster product stays on Redis 7.x
  • −Limited multi-region write options

Great for

  • +Caching for GKE, Cloud Run and App Engine apps
  • +Session storage and rate limiting on Google Cloud
  • +Vector similarity lookups close to app data

Think twice for

  • −Multi-cloud deployments
  • −Durable primary storage

Capabilities

Native or official first-party support · 11 of 25 tracked

✓Transactions
✓Vector search
✓Geospatial
✓Stored procedures
✓TTL / expiry
✓Pub/Sub
✓In-memory
✓Durable persistence
✓Encryption at rest
✓Role-based access
✓Streaming ingest
–Joins
–Secondary indexes
–Full-text search
–JSON
–Change data capture
–Triggers
–Materialized views
–Columnar storage
–Compression
–Time travel
–Branching
–Online schema changes
–Offline sync
–Runs in WebAssembly

Scale & consistency

Comfortable data size
Medium · ≤ 10 TB
Horizontal scaling
Native
Multi-region
Read replicas
Transactions
Limited ACID
Consistency
Eventual
Schema
Schemaless
Architecture
In memory, Primary replica, Distributed
Query languages
Redis commands (RESP), Memcached protocol, Lua

Valkey and Redis Cluster shard across nodes with online scaling; cross-region replication for DR.

Deployment

Self-hosted Vendor-managed cloud Serverless Embedded Edge Kubernetes operator

available on · Google Cloud

Ecosystem

compatible withRedis, Memcached
apis & protocolsRESP2/RESP3, Memcached text protocol
client languagesPython, Java, JavaScript, Go, C#, Rust, Ruby, PHP, C

Alternatives to Google Cloud Memorystore

Compare all→
ValkeyKey-Value58.0

The Linux Foundation's BSD-licensed fork of Redis, now the default engine on AWS and Google Cloud.

google-memorystore vs valkey →
Amazon ElastiCacheKey-Value29.1

AWS's managed Valkey, Redis OSS and Memcached service, provisioned or serverless.

google-memorystore vs amazon-elasticache →
Azure Managed RedisKey-Value0.4

Microsoft's managed Redis built on Redis Enterprise, replacing the retiring Azure Cache for Redis.

google-memorystore vs azure-cache-for-redis →
RedisKey-Value84.3

The in-memory data structure server that became the default cache, now with search, JSON and vectors built in.

google-memorystore vs redis →
MomentoKey-Value9.0

Managed Valkey and serverless cache/pub-sub from ex-DynamoDB engineers, plus self-hosted Valkey tooling.

google-memorystore vs momento →
Microsoft GarnetKey-Value7.8

Microsoft Research's .NET cache-store that speaks RESP and scales across cores and storage tiers.

google-memorystore vs garnet →

Google Cloud Memorystore FAQ

What is Google Cloud Memorystore?

Google Cloud Memorystore is a key-value database by Google Cloud, first released in 2018. Memorystore is Google Cloud's umbrella for managed caches: Memorystore for Valkey (Google's lead engine, with 9.0 as default and 9.1 in preview), Memorystore for Redis Cluster, the older single-node/standard Memorystore for Redis, and Memorystore for Memcached. The Valkey and Redis Cluster products offer zero-downtime scaling, Private Service Connect networking, persistence (RDB/AOF) and up to 99.99% SLA, and Valkey adds vector search. It is the default choice for GKE and Cloud Run apps that need a cache; cross-region options are limited to replicas and DR.

Is Google Cloud Memorystore open source?

No. Google Cloud Memorystore is proprietary, closed-source software. License: Google Cloud service terms.

Does Google Cloud Memorystore support ACID transactions?

Partly. Google Cloud Memorystore offers limited ACID guarantees (for example, single-record or single-partition transactions), with eventual consistency.

Does Google Cloud Memorystore scale horizontally?

Google Cloud Memorystore scales horizontally out of the box, with built-in sharding or partitioning. It is comfortable at medium scale (≤ 10 TB). It supports cross-region read replicas.

How can I run Google Cloud Memorystore?

You can use the vendor's managed cloud. It is available on Google Cloud.

What is Google Cloud Memorystore best for?

Google Cloud Memorystore is a strong fit for caching for GKE, Cloud Run and App Engine apps; session storage and rate limiting on Google Cloud; and vector similarity lookups close to app data. Think twice for multi-cloud deployments.

What are the best alternatives to Google Cloud Memorystore?

Common alternatives to Google Cloud Memorystore include Valkey, Amazon ElastiCache, Azure Managed Redis, Redis and Momento. The right choice depends on your workload, scale and hosting; WhichDB's smart match ranks them against your requirements.

How popular is Google Cloud Memorystore?

Google Cloud Memorystore ranks #377 of 844 databases on the WhichDB Score (5.6/100), and #53 among key-value databases. The score combines public adoption signals such as package downloads, GitHub activity, job posts and developer discussion.