--- title: "Percona Server Software Pricing, Alternatives & More 2026 | Capterra" description: "With the help of Capterra, learn about Percona Server Software - reviews, pricing plans, popular comparisons to other Database products and more." source_url: "https://www.capterra.com/p/133993/Percona-Server/" page_type: "product" language: "en" publication_date: "2026-10-21" --- # Percona Server Software Review 2026: Features, Integrations, Pros & Cons Last updated on October 21, 2026 Provider data verified by our Software Research team, and reviews moderated by our Reviews Verification team. [Description](#description)[Use cases](#use-cases)[Alternatives](#alternatives)[FAQs](#faqs)[Features](#features)[Pricing](#pricing)[Support](#support)[Reviews](#reviews) Percona Server ## What is Percona Server? Percona Server for MySQL is a free, fully-compatible, enhanced, open-source drop-in replacement for MySQL. It provides superior performance, scalability, and instrumentation. With over 5,300,000 downloads, Percona Servers self-tuning algorithms and support for extremely high-performance hardware delivers excellent performance and reliability. ## What is Percona Server used for? [Database](https://www.capterra.com/database-management-software/) Top alternative Featured Overall rating Based on 26 user reviews Reviews sentiment Positive 100% Neutral 0% Negative 0% ### Starting price Free trial available Capterra Shortlist charts the highest-rated and most popular products... Our "Best of" badge program showcases products with the highest ratings... Our "Best of" badge program showcases products with the highest ratings... Do you work for Percona Server?[Manage this product listing](https://www.g2.com/products/percona-server/claim_requests/new?auto=true) ## Compare with a popular alternative Capterra selects software alternatives based on relevant features, verified user reviews and user interactions. Placement may be influenced by client status. ### Percona Server 4.8 (26) VS. [4.6 (2,251)](https://www.capterra.com/p/146652/Airtable/reviews/) Starting Price Contact vendor Starting Price $20 Per User, Per Month Free Trial Free Version Pricing Options Free Trial Free Version Ease Of Use 4.7 (26) Ease Of Use 4.4 (1,983) Value For Money 4.6 (19) Value For Money 4.5 (1,514) Customer Service 4.6 (19) Customer Service 4.4 (1,440) ## Percona Server alternatives [Microsoft SQL Server](https://www.capterra.com/p/1417/SQL-Server/) [4.6 (1,983)](https://www.capterra.com/p/1417/SQL-Server/reviews/) Starting price $13748.00 Per User, Per Month Pricing Options Free Trial Free Version User Rating 97% of reviewers rated it above 4 stars [Learn More](https://www.capterra.com/p/1417/SQL-Server/) [MySQL](https://www.capterra.com/p/11482/MySQL/) [4.6 (2,100)](https://www.capterra.com/p/11482/MySQL/reviews/) Starting price $2000.00 Per User, Per Month Pricing Options Free Trial Free Version User Rating 96% of reviewers rated it above 4 stars [Learn More](https://www.capterra.com/p/11482/MySQL/) [Microsoft Access](https://www.capterra.com/p/233275/Microsoft-Access/) [4.4 (214)](https://www.capterra.com/p/233275/Microsoft-Access/reviews/) Starting price Contact vendor for pricing Pricing Options Free Trial Free Version User Rating 91% of reviewers rated it above 4 stars [Learn More](https://www.capterra.com/p/233275/Microsoft-Access/) Highest Rated [Google Cloud](https://www.capterra.com/p/268690/Google-Cloud-Platform/) [4.7 (2,342)](https://www.capterra.com/p/268690/Google-Cloud-Platform/reviews/) Starting price Contact vendor for pricing Pricing Options Free Trial Free Version User Rating 96% of reviewers rated it above 4 stars [Learn More](https://www.capterra.com/p/268690/Google-Cloud-Platform/) [View all alternatives](https://www.capterra.com/p/133993/Percona-Server/alternatives/) ## FAQs about Percona Server Overview ### Which roles and teams benefit most from Percona Server? Percona Server is most used by software developers and engineers, database administrators, and data engineering teams managing MySQL workloads, query performance, and application reliability. Systems administrators support server operations and monitoring, while solution and database architects plan scalable data environments. Project managers and business leaders use it to oversee database-backed delivery requirements. Answer based on 25 reviews Overview ### What company size and specific industries is Percona Server built for? Percona Server is designed for small businesses, mid-market companies, and enterprise teams that need database support from DBAs, SysAdmins, DevOps professionals, and developers. It is suited to organizations that manage MySQL-based environments and require technical staff to handle database administration and development tasks. Features and Usability ### What are the key features of Percona Server? Percona Server offers access controls and permissions, backup and recovery, and data replication for database administration. It also includes data dictionary management, data storage management, support for multiple programming languages, and relational database management for organizing and querying structured data. Getting Started and Support ### What training and onboarding options does Percona Server offer? Percona Server provides webinars and documentation for training and onboarding. Webinars offer live or scheduled sessions for guided instruction, while documentation gives written reference material for self-paced learning, setup steps, and feature details. Getting Started and Support ### What customer support options does Percona Server offer? Percona Server provides 24/7 Live Rep and Chat support. Users describe help as available through the community and Percona’s support services, with guidance for questions and critical security backports. Some also note that newer versions can lag, which may affect timely support for patching needs. Answer based on 3 reviews ## Features AI summary Based on 2,782 Database reviews Capterra reviewers highlight these features as the top priorities when choosing a database solution: - **Secure Data Storage** (**55%** of reviewers rated this feature as critical) - **Data Storage Management** (**52%**) - **Backup and Recovery** (**55%**) Percona Server includes **Data Storage Management** and **Backup and Recovery**, giving teams the tools to organize database resources efficiently and restore data when issues occur. However, it does not offer **Secure Data Storage**. Instead, it provides **Access Controls/Permissions** (**42%**), which can help limit who can view or change sensitive information. Together, these features help businesses maintain database performance, reduce downtime, and give teams more control over data availability and access. Data Storage Management 4.6 (15) 80.00% of 15 reviewers that rated this feature as important or highly important Manage and store data in a database Backup and Recovery 4.8 (17) 64.71% of 17 reviewers that rated this feature as important or highly important Create backups and provide methods to recover deleted/lost data Access Controls/Permissions 5.0 (1) 100.00% of 1 reviewers that rated this feature as important or highly important Define levels of authorization for access to specific files or systems Data Replication 4.3 (16) 68.75% of 16 reviewers that rated this feature as important or highly important Process of copying and storing data in more than one site or node Multiple Programming Languages Supported 4.1 (15) 40.00% of 15 reviewers that rated this feature as important or highly important Run stored procedures and queries in multiple programming languages, such as JSON, Java, Python, Ruby, Perl, and SQL Data Dictionary Management 4.4 (14) 71.43% of 14 reviewers that rated this feature as important or highly important Stores definitions of the data elements and their relationships (metadata) and how they are retrieved for the user Percona Server 7 features ### All Features - Access Controls/Permissions: Define levels of authorization for access to specific files or systems - Backup and Recovery: Create backups and provide methods to recover deleted/lost data - Data Dictionary Management: Stores definitions of the data elements and their relationships (metadata) and how they are retrieved for the user - Data Replication: Process of copying and storing data in more than one site or node - Data Storage Management: Manage and store data in a database - Multiple Programming Languages Supported: Run stored procedures and queries in multiple programming languages, such as JSON, Java, Python, Ruby, Perl, and SQL - Relational Database Management: Database management based on relationships between data --- Get Advice We can help you find the software with the features you need. Features 4.8 (26) 4.8 Based on 26 reviews ## Pricing Value for money 4.6 (19) ### Starting price Free trial available Value for money 4.6 (19) 4.6 Based on 19 reviews Connect with a Capterra advisor for a free 15-minute consultation Get a personalized software list aligned to your business needs with guidance from our expert advisors. Our team has helped 1 million+ businesses like yours find options that fit their needs. ## Support, customer service and training options Customer Service 4.6 (19) Support - Email/Help Desk - FAQs/Forum - Knowledge Base - Phone Support - 24/7 (Live rep) - Chat Training - In Person - Live Online - Webinars - Documentation - Videos Deployment - Web - Android - iPhone/iPad Typical users - Freelancers - Small businesses - Mid size businesses - Enterprises Customer Service 4.6 (19) 4.6 Based on 19 reviews ## User reviews Overall rating 4.8 Based on 26 reviews Filter by rating Counts reflect reviews available in this feed. 5(21) 4(5) 3(0) 2(0) 1(0) Mentioned topic Recent reviews first, then most helpful Douglas D. Principle Database Architect Used the software for: 3-5 years ### "High Performance and Availability with Percona Server for MySQL" 5.0 Overall Rating 5.0 5.0 Ease of Use 5.0 5.0 Features 5.0 5.0 Customer Service 5.0 5.0 Likelihood to Recommend 10/10 October 13, 2020 Percona Server for MySQL is being used across our whole organization. We are running 50+ primary instances in our data center with DR replica's running on compute instances inside GCP in 2 different regions. Percona Server for MySQL solves our need for well-tested and stable MySQL instances with Percona doing additional testing to the upstream releases which gives that added level of stability that we need for the massive volumes of processing as well as the required performance in sharded instances. Pros Performance Stability Additional Variables for in-depth monitoring Easy migration path to Percona XtraDB Cluster Community Support Return on Investment: Percona Server for MySQL is open source with no hidden licensing costs which gives us huge savings on the high number of instances that are required on premise and in the cloud. Cons No option for a distributed database yet in order to scale writes, but Percona Server for MySQL has exceptional performance when using sharding. Review source Non-incentivized review: any software user can leave a review for any product listed on our site. All submitted reviews are subject to our verification process prior to publication. RE Reviewer Principal Data Engineer Used the software for: 3-5 years ### "Free MySQL Enterprise" 5.0 Overall Rating 5.0 5.0 Ease of Use 5.0 5.0 Features 5.0 5.0 Customer Service 5.0 5.0 Likelihood to Recommend 10/10 October 13, 2020 MySQL is a great product but when you use it in professionally you notice that some enterprise features are missing from the community version. Percona Server for MySQL includes all the enterprise features you could need by free, while being the same MySQL version you can find with the original vendor. This is a huge advantage, a true 100% drop-in replacement that has enterprise grade capabilities for no cost. If you are not using it, you should! Opinions expressed here are my own and not the opinions of my employer. Pros Percona Server for MySQL includes enterprise grade features like: - Encryption - Audit - Data Masking - AD/LDAP authentication - Physical backups Cons New version take some time to come out, so you will always be one version behind Oracle. Not the best thing if you need to comply with security patches. For this you would need to complete this with Percona Support services, where they can help you with critical security backports if needed. Review source Non-incentivized review: any software user can leave a review for any product listed on our site. All submitted reviews are subject to our verification process prior to publication. Verified Reviewer Software Developer Used the software for: I used a free trial ### "Percona Server for MySQL can beat old SQL servers." 4.0 Overall Rating 4.0 4.0 Ease of Use 4.0 4.0 Features 5.0 5.0 Customer Service 4.0 4.0 Likelihood to Recommend 6/10 October 28, 2020 Pros MYSQL server acts as root of the organization and it should be best comprising of various features like scalability, deployement, logging and compatibilty. Percona product provides all these factors in best form so that MYSQL server delivers extremely high-performance and reliability to more of the enterprises that drive businesses online. Personal experience, i have heard alot about percona server from my colleagues too and its worth trying because of its awesome features. Cons In my opinion pricing can be the issue in percona server as it sounds lil bit expensive for me and will be getting charged if server is in use or not. Review source Non-incentivized review: any software user can leave a review for any product listed on our site. All submitted reviews are subject to our verification process prior to publication. Anshika G. Software Developer Used the software for: Less than 1 year ### "Review for Percona Server" 5.0 Overall Rating 5.0 5.0 Ease of Use 5.0 5.0 Features 5.0 5.0 Customer Service 5.0 5.0 Likelihood to Recommend 10/10 February 4, 2022 Very Satisfying product Pros It is very easy to use and fully compatible. It enhances the performances and most important is its in the field of open source. There is no hidden cost of licensing. It gives us huge amount of savings on numerous perfoperformances. Cons In somewhat what i donot like is pricing I think its might be little bit expensive. Review source Non-incentivized review: any software user can leave a review for any product listed on our site. All submitted reviews are subject to our verification process prior to publication. RE Reviewer Senior Software Developer Used the software for: Less than 1 year ### "A great alternative to stock Oracle MySQL" 5.0 November 6, 2020 We're using it at our test and production servers, after migrating from MariaDB. Overall, it has been a very positive experience! :) Pros Seamless installation in relation to Oracle MySQL, good performance, better metrics when using it together with Percona Monitoring Tools. Cons Release versions tend to be slightly lower than the Oracle ones. But that is expected, since Percona needs to patch and test it before releasing. So, not a big issue. Review source Non-incentivized review: any software user can leave a review for any product listed on our site. All submitted reviews are subject to our verification process prior to publication. RE Reviewer DBA Used the software for: 3-5 years ### "Percona is a great drop in replacement for MYSQL" 5.0 Overall Rating 5.0 5.0 Ease of Use 5.0 5.0 Features 5.0 5.0 Customer Service 5.0 5.0 Likelihood to Recommend 8/10 October 7, 2020 I have been using percona software since past 7 years. Have deployed it in production setups and it works great. I have also used percona tools for monitoring . Percona xtrabackup and Percona xtradb cluster. They all work great. Its a good replacement for MySQL and offers enterprise level features. Pros Its faster, easier to deploy, opensource. Percona offers several tools to diagnose MySQL issues. Cons replication could be better like mongodb replicaset . Review source Non-incentivized review: any software user can leave a review for any product listed on our site. All submitted reviews are subject to our verification process prior to publication. Medline M. Project Manager Used the software for: 1-3 years ### "Percona Server scalibility is excellent for larger databases" 5.0 Overall Rating 5.0 5.0 Ease of Use 5.0 5.0 Features 5.0 5.0 Customer Service 5.0 5.0 Likelihood to Recommend 10/10 May 26, 2020 Overall, I think Percona server is one of the best open-source server for MySQL! Pros There are many things that I love about the Percona server. It provides additional counters and diagnostics to assess performance and also has a massive amount of scalability for clients with larger databases. Cons After using this server on and off for several clients I have not run into any issues thus far. Review source Non-incentivized review: any software user can leave a review for any product listed on our site. All submitted reviews are subject to our verification process prior to publication. RE Reviewer Network and Systems Administrator Used the software for: 3-5 years ### "Open source "enterprise" features" 5.0 Overall Rating 5.0 5.0 Ease of Use 5.0 5.0 Features 5.0 5.0 Customer Service 5.0 5.0 Likelihood to Recommend 10/10 June 6, 2025 I've utilized Percona Server with Percona's support for a number of years now. Both have been amazing to work with especially when it comes to tuning MySQL, Percona is a great resource to utilize. Pros I very much like the additional monitoring of Percona Server vs traditional MySQL. I've setup countless servers now with LDAP integration and audit logging without needing to pay for enterprise MySQL. Additionally the integrations for additional monitoring with Percona Monitoring and Management (PMM) has been extremely useful when attempting to evaluate overall health of my MySQL cluster. Cons I don't actually have any cons per se. Percona Server is a drop in replacement for traditional MySQL which makes migrations easy. Review source Non-incentivized review: any software user can leave a review for any product listed on our site. All submitted reviews are subject to our verification process prior to publication. Harjit L. MySQL DBA Used the software for: 3-5 years ### "Great MySQL database server from Percona" 5.0 Overall Rating 5.0 5.0 Ease of Use 5.0 5.0 Features 5.0 5.0 Customer Service 5.0 5.0 Likelihood to Recommend 10/10 October 13, 2020 Percona provide great software. I woulld highly recommend them. Obviously look at what your needs are and check that you get all the functionality you require. Pros Very easy to install and and use. Well documented. Easy to upgrade. Enterprise standard. Paid support available if needed. Cons WIthout paid support you have to google any issues so takes a bit longer to resolve. Review source Non-incentivized review: any software user can leave a review for any product listed on our site. All submitted reviews are subject to our verification process prior to publication. Musa M. Systems Administrator Used the software for: 1-3 years ### "Looking for a clustering solution and first found percona Xtradb cluster and feel in love." 5.0 Overall Rating 5.0 5.0 Ease of Use 4.0 4.0 Features 5.0 5.0 Customer Service 4.0 4.0 Likelihood to Recommend 8/10 July 23, 2018 It simplified database administration for my organization and helped us scale our applications to handle spikes in traffic. Pros I like the fact that it was way easier than I thought to setup and migrate our databases over. Also, with automated backups and reports, I get a bird's eye view of our whole database infrastructure with respect to health, performance and resources. Cons There were many components to choose from depending on what your needs are and that can daunting to a first time username. Review source Non-incentivized review: any software user can leave a review for any product listed on our site. All submitted reviews are subject to our verification process prior to publication. [View all Reviews](https://www.capterra.com/p/133993/Percona-Server/reviews/) ## Top-rated software of 2026 ### Fill out the form and we'll send a list of the top-rated software based on real user reviews directly to your inbox. Popular comparisons [Microsoft SQL Server vs Percona Server](https://www.capterra.com/compare/1417-133993/SQL-Server-vs-Percona-Server) [MySQL vs Percona Server](https://www.capterra.com/compare/11482-133993/MySQL-vs-Percona-Server)