Comparing replication solutions v6.3.1

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Replication solutions differ significantly in how they handle multi-region deployments, conflict management, schema changes, and major version upgrades. Use this comparison to evaluate PGD against other options across those dimensions.

Last updated: 2026-04-14

Product	Version
PGD Standalone	6.3.1
PGD Managed	6.3.1
PSR + EFM	5.0

Deployment

Product	On premise	Cloud	Multi-cloud	Hybrid (on-prem + cloud)	SLA	Native Kubernetes Operator
PGD Standalone	✓	✓	✓	✓	99.999	✓ (PGD for Kubernetes (GA Q1 2025), based on CloudNativePG)
PGD Managed	✓	✓	✓	✗	99.995	✓
PSR + EFM	✓	✓	✓	✓	99.99	Partial (CloudNativePG, no native EFM integration)

Performance

Product	Read scalability	Horizontal scalability	Transaction streaming	Parallel apply (vertical scalability)	Logical Change Record (LCR) sharing
PGD Standalone	✓ (subscriber only nodes)	✗	✓	✓	✓ (decodes WAL once, shares to all subscribers)
PGD Managed	✗	✗	✓	✓	✓
PSR + EFM	✓ (physical standbys)	✗	✓	✗	✗ (decodes per subscriber)

Durability

Product	Asynchronous replication	Optional RPO limit for asynchronous replication	Synchronous replication	Consensus based replication	Per transaction durability setting
PGD Standalone	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
PGD Managed	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
PSR + EFM	✓	✗	✓	✗	✓

Consistency

Product	Automatic conflict management	Conflict avoidance types	Conflict avoidance at commit (pessimistic conflict handling)	Builtin distributed sequence	CRDT (Conflict-Free Replicated Data Types)
PGD Standalone	✓	✓	✓	✓ (snowflake (bigint), galloc (int/bigint))	✓ (multiple nodes update same row simultaneously without global locking)
PGD Managed	✓	✓	✓	✓ (snowflake (bigint), galloc (int/bigint))	✓
PSR + EFM	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	✗

Data distribution

Product	Data residency/selective replication	Cluster level Active-Active (writers in different regions)	Regional Active-Active (multiple writers within region)	Automatic partitioning	Offload cold data to cheaper storage
PGD Standalone	✓	✓	✓ (not recommended unless specific setup)	✓	✓
PGD Managed	✓	✓	✗	✓	✓
PSR + EFM	✗	✗	✗	✓ with EPAS	✗

Maintenance

Product	Near-zero downtime major version upgrades by adding nodes	Near-zero downtime inplace major version upgrades	Rolling schema upgrades/green-blue (with application assistance)	Rolling maintenance operations
PGD Standalone	✓	✓	✓	✓
PGD Managed	✓	✓	✓	✓
PSR + EFM	✓ (using logical replication)	✗	✗	✗

Connection Management

Product	Automatic failover	Automatic connection failover for switchover	Cluster level connection routing	Region level connection routing	pgbouncer support	Built-in connection manager (no external consensus/proxy required)
PGD Standalone	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓ (PGD 6.0+, eliminates HARP + etcd dependency)
PGD Managed	✓	✓	✓	✓	✗	✓
PSR + EFM	✓	✓	✓	✗	✓	✗ (requires pgbouncer / HAProxy)

DDL support

Product	General DDL replication	Granular (per-object) DDL locking	Create and drop objects	Add columns to table	Change column type	CREATE TABLE AS
PGD Standalone	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓ (rewrite requires permit_unsafe_commands)	✓ (with restrictions)
PGD Managed	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓ (rewrite requires permit_unsafe_commands)	✓ (with restrictions)
PSR + EFM	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓

Postgres compatibility

Product	Latest supported version	Works on standard PG	Supports TDE	Supports custom types (i.e. PostGIS)	Supports extensions	CDC failover support	Large Object support	Multiple DB support
PGD Standalone	18	✓	✓ with EPAS/PGE	✓	Many	✓ (PGD 5.7+)	✗	✗
PGD Managed	18	✗	✓ with EPAS/PGE	✓	Many	✓ (PGD 5.7+)	✗	✗
PSR + EFM	17	✓	✓ with EPAS/PGE	✓	All	✓	✓	✓

Management

Product	CLI	UI	Monitoring options
PGD Standalone	✓	✓ (PEM)	Hybrid Manager, SQL, CLI, PEM
PGD Managed	✓	✓	Hybrid Manager, SQL, CLI, edbctl
PSR + EFM	✓	✓ (PEM)	Hybrid Manager, SQL, CLI, PEM

Licensing

Product	Source available	Open source
PGD Standalone	✗	✗
PGD Managed	✗	✗
PSR + EFM	✗	✗

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