Alibaba Cloud's PolarDB sets new world record on TPC-C test

Alibaba Cloud's PolarDB has achieved a new world record for performance in the TPC-C benchmark.

The TPC-C benchmark, established by the Transaction Processing Performance Council (TPC), evaluates Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) systems under extreme conditions. This benchmark is recognised as one of the most authoritative in the industry, assessing a database's capability to maintain data accuracy, ensure consistency during failures, and provide availability under stress.

According to the benchmark result, PolarDB executed 2.055 billion transactions per minute (tpmC), performing 2.5 times better than the previous record holder. Additionally, it reduced the cost per transaction by approximately 40% to CNY 0.8 (USD $0.11). During an extensive 8-hour stress test, PolarDB processed 2.2 trillion data operations with complete data accuracy. It achieved a transaction fluctuation rate of just 0.16%, significantly lower than the benchmark's 2% threshold.

Further illustrating its performance, PolarDB's recent achievement marked a transaction volume 59 times greater than the peak recorded during Alibaba's Tmall 11.11 Shopping Festival in 2020.

Dr Feifei Li, President of Database Products Business at Alibaba Cloud Intelligence, commented, "This remarkable achievement is a testament to our team's relentless pursuit of innovation and excellence in database technology. PolarDB's performance in the TPC-C benchmark showcases its capability to handle the most demanding workloads while emphasising our commitment to providing cost-effective and scalable solutions. With innovative architecture, managing cloud-native databases will be as simple as 'building blocks'. We will continue to support our customers to effectively manage and utilise data to thrive in the digital era."

The performance of PolarDB is attributed to its Limitless Architecture, featuring a "three-layer decoupling" design. This architecture improves efficiency by allowing independent scaling of computing, memory, and storage, optimising elasticity. The performance is further enhanced by software-hardware integration and advances in database kernel optimisation, including transaction processing improvements, index structure refinements, and I/O path enhancements.

PolarDB is designed to support business-critical applications that require rapid performance, high concurrency, and automatic scaling. It has been implemented to assist the digital transformation of over 10,000 enterprise customers globally. Notable examples include TNG eWallet, Malaysia's largest fintech platform; Television Broadcasts Limited in Hong Kong, known for Chinese TV programme production; enish, Inc., a mobile game developer in Japan; and DOKU, a prominent payment technology firm in Indonesia.

Alibaba Cloud offers a wide array of self-developed, cloud-native database products. These include the PolarDB relational database, the AnalyticDB data warehouse, the multimodal database Lindorm, and the Data Management Service (DMS). Alibaba Cloud has maintained a leadership position for the fifth consecutive year in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Cloud Database Management Systems (DBMS).