When to use Read Replicas vs. bigger compute

When database performance slows, the decision between using Read Replicas or upgrading to bigger compute resources hinges on specific workload characteristics and budget considerations. Vertical scaling, or increasing compute size, is generally simpler and requires no code changes, making it suitable for write-heavy environments where Replicas offer no benefit. Conversely, Read Replicas are effective for isolating analytics workloads from production databases, efficiently handling read-heavy tasks, and providing redundancy, especially useful when analytics queries impact application performance. The guide further elaborates on diagnosing performance issues through query patterns and resource utilization to determine the most cost-effective scaling strategy. It also introduces alternative solutions like Supabase ETL and Analytics Buckets for handling extensive analytical workloads and Multigres for potential future horizontal scaling needs.

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