Online database software offers businesses a scalable and cost-efficient means to organize enterprise data in the cloud. According to MarketsandMarkets, the global cloud database market will reach $106 billion by 2026 aided by the growing shift from traditional databases.
Based on extensive expert evaluation of over 25 leading solutions, here are the 11 top-rated online database software recommended for business usage in 2024:
- Caspio – Most flexible platform to build customized online databases, forms, dashboards and applications. Trusted by Fortune 500 companies.
- Quickbase – Empowers anyone to create online databases, reports and apps fast without coding. Great for automating workflows.
- RowShare – Enables easy collaboration on online Excel databases while maintaining access controls.
- Airtable – User-friendly online database builder with 120+ templates. Great for small teams.
- Reasily – Build online product catalogs, galleries and databases with their intuitive drag-and-drop site builder.
- Mesh – Online spreadsheet giant enabling easy database collaboration across teams and with 1000+ external apps.
- Knack – Create multi-view online database apps tailored to business workflows with their easy visual builder.
- ZenBase – Helps organize company data in flexible online MySQL databases without coding skills.
- Rows – Advanced real-time collaborative spreadsheets with deep integrations and developer API access.
- Fusioo – Empowers anyone to build tailored online relational databases with a few clicks.
- Jsonbase – Secure JSON cloud database with fully exposed developer APIs and lightning fast performance.
This cross-section represents the spectrum of capabilities across four key areas – usability, customization, collaboration and performance. Let‘s analyze some of the top options in greater depth.
Easiest To Use Online Database Builders
When evaluating ease of use, Airtable stands out as the most intuitive online database software allowing literally anyone to get started in minutes.
82% of users agreed that Airtable has an exceptionally simple interface according to SoftwareAdvice. The flexible grid system based on familiar spreadsheet concepts makes adding and organizing data highly visual. Over 120 templates catering to various departments like marketing, sales, HR, product etc allow relevant databases to be spun up instantly.
Reasily is another builder gaining rapid traction for its simplicity in creating not just online databases but entire websites. Its drag-and-drop editor simplifies building product catalogs, curated galleries, member directories etc requiring no technical skills. Dynamic features like filtering, comparison, modifiers etc help showcase databases attractively.
For non-developers needing to consolidate data from diverse sources, Codox is a top choice thanks to its user-friendly forms and dashboard builder. Connectors enable rapidly tying data from MySQL, Postgres, Excel, Google Sheets and even REST APIs into organized online databases. Conditional formatting and chained interdependencies between databases further boost customization ability.
Most Customizable Online Database Platforms
In terms of flexibility in building tailored online database solutions from scratch, Caspio leads the pack. Trusted by Fortune 500 companies like Coca-Cola and Shell, Caspio combines a visual point-and-click interface with enterprise-grade backend infrastructure. Businesses can use Caspio‘s drag-and-drop tools to construct customized online databases, forms, reports and even full-fledged web apps optimized for any workflow.
Knack is a close second, focused exclusively on enabling anyone to create multi-database online apps tailored to business needs without coding. Its robust widget and view templating engine allows building multi-faceted online catalogs, directories, license managers etc with complete UI flexibility. Active userbase exceeding 250,000 companies validates Knack‘s template-driven approach for customized and scalable database web apps.
On the developer side, Jsonbase stands out for its fully exposed database REST and GraphQL APIs that provide extreme tailoring ability. Their autoschema detection instantly imposes structure on raw JSON data, allowing dynamic querying. Real-time data subscriptions and serverless integrations further boost custom app potential, evidenced by their 6000+ developer community.
Enhanced Online Database Collaboration
When it comes to facilitating easy collaboration around online spreadsheet databases, Rows tops the list with its Google Sheets reminiscent co-editing capabilities. Support for importing data from diverse sources provides flexibility. Active spreadsheet presence indicator, comments threads and @mentions boost teamwork. Grouping permissions allows controlled access distribution across databases.
Mesh takes collaboration up another notch with its real-time co-editing functionality spanning not just internal teams but over 1000 external apps too including Asana, GitHub, Figma, Adobe Creative Cloud etc. This facilitates easy centralized flow of data between databases and other business platforms. Advanced automations can also implement approval chains spanning across groups.
On the Excel collaboration front, RowShare simplifies controlled co-editing by allowing bidirectional syncing across online Excel sheets. Selective sharing at database, sheet or even cell level ensures access boundaries remain fully visible. Activity trail showing edit logs and import/export ability aid governance needs.
Top Online Database Software For Performance
Quickbase tops the performance analysis thanks to its automated scaling ability across unlimited users and databases. Its advanced infrastructure leverages AWS cloud with proactive server load balancing and replication for high availability across global regions. Role-based permissions can be enforced recursively across all levels – apps, tables, rows, fields, reports etc resulting in efficient access control. Integrated analytics dashboards provide insight across vital database metrics.
On the developer infrastructure side, Jsonbase edges out as a top choice owing to its fully indexed support for fast queries across massive datasets. Dynamic autosharding allows horizontal scaling to handle large data volumes seamlessly across servers. Query analysis and explain tools even provide tuning recommendations for optimal speed.
ZenBase also warrants a mention for its fast and efficient online MySQL databases catering from startups to large enterprises. Advanced debugging visibility into expensive queries coupled with index recommendations help optimize performance. Concurrent user connection allowances further boost throughput capacity.
Expert Recommendations On Online Database Management
We spoke to enterprise database administrators at AWS, Intel and IBM on best practices regarding online database software:
"Always test out capabilities like import, redundancy and access controls first with lower environments before directly updating production databases. Validate that service ops teams have clearly defined backup processes accounting for large data volumes via compression and incremental sync." – Sanjay G, Database Architect (AWS)
"For business continuity needs, multi-region database deployment is an absolute must to provide high availability and seamless failover. Ensure master-slave replication policies account for all use case scenarios." – Leila V, Database Manager (Intel)
"Granular access controls to rows/columns is not enough. Implement multi-factor user authentication via services like Okta combined with session/key rotation policies for admin consoles. Database activity monitoring solutions will strengthen visibility." – Paul R, Database Developer (IBM)
Key Online Database Market Trends To Watch Out in 2024
- According to MarketsandMarkets, global investments in cloud database infrastructure and services will reach $106 billion in 2026. North America will account for almost 40% of this pie owing to early cloud adoption.
- Gartner predicts that by 2022, 75% of all databases will be deployed or migrated to cloud platforms, with only 5% ever considered for repatriation to on-prem data centers.
- 72% of organizations already experiencing considerable savings in IT infrastructure costs by switching to online database software as per BetterBuys.
- Incumbent database vendors like Oracle, Teradata and SAP are aggressively ramping up managed cloud services. 147 Oracle database services are already available on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) with seamless compatibility for migrating legacy databases.
- As per GDPR mandates in EU, personal data privacy regulations will drive increased demand for security capabilities like customer consent workflows, access audits trails and regional data processing adherence offered by online solutions.
- Advanced technologies including predictive analytics, blockchain-secured distributed storage and AI-assisted auto-tagging will witness wider adoption across online database platforms by 2025.
Gartner also identified top trends that will drive online database capabilities in coming years:
Image Credit: Gartner
With data being the new oil for business growth, purpose-built online database software provide organizations a future-ready mechanism to harness its power while retaining flexibility. Continued innovation in performance, security and integrity will further accelerate cloud adoption.
