Latency Comparison Among Serverless Databases: DynamoDB vs FaunaDB vs Upstash

The article presents a comparative analysis of the latencies of three serverless databases—DynamoDB, FaunaDB, and Upstash (Redis)—using a sample news website where each database stores 7,001 New York Times articles scored randomly. The study records database-related latency for fetching the top 10 articles from each database using AWS Lambda functions, with the latency measured between the Lambda function and the database, excluding browser-server latency. It reveals that Upstash exhibits the lowest latency (~50ms at the 99th percentile), while FaunaDB shows the highest (~900ms), attributed to its strong consistency and global replication; DynamoDB stands at ~200ms. Additionally, the cold start effect in serverless environments, notably impacting FaunaDB and Redis, influences latency, with optimizations like reusing client connections mitigating some delays. Future enhancements for Upstash include a Premium product with multi-zone replication, and ongoing discussions on forums like HackerNews have prompted modifications to the FaunaDB setup for more accurate benchmarking.