Milvus vs PG Vector
Compare deployment options, cost efficiency, and features to choose the right vector database for your application.
Database Comparison
Two competitive vector databases, closely matched.
Both Milvus and PG Vector are powerful vector databases designed for efficient similarity search and storage. They show comparable performance across key metrics.
Key similarities:
- Similar deployment flexibility
- Comparable cost structures
- Similar feature sets
Milvus
Milvus is a flexible, open-source vector database built for local and hybrid cloud deployment. With support for IVF, HNSW, and DiskANN, it provides the widest indexing variety for tuning performance on large-scale workloads. Milvus is ideal when you want control, configurability, and low infrastructure cost.
PG Vector
PG Vector is a popular Postgres extension that adds vector search capabilities directly inside a traditional relational database. It is ideal for teams that want to keep embeddings, metadata, and application data in one system without operating a separate vector database.
Feature Comparison
Infrastructure & Technical Details
| Feature | Milvus | PG Vector |
|---|---|---|
| Deployment | Self-Hosted, Managed Cloud | Self-Hosted, Managed Cloud |
| Cost | Free (self-hosted), infra cost only | Free (extension), infra cost only |
| License | Apache 2.0 | PostgreSQL |
| Index Types | IVF, HNSW, DiskANN | Flat, IVFFlat, HNSW |
| Cloud Providers | Any | AWS RDS, Azure Postgres, GCP AlloyDB, Supabase, Timescale |
| Regional Flexibility | high | high |
| Strengths Count | 9 | 9 |
| Weaknesses Count | 6 | 7 |