# PlanetScale vs Prisma Postgres

Canonical: https://inetgeek.com/compare/planetscale-vs-prisma-postgres/

Every value below is read from PlanetScale's and Prisma Postgres's own documentation. See https://inetgeek.com/methodology/ for how.

## At a glance

| Criterion | PlanetScale | Prisma Postgres |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Free tier | No | Yes |
| Entry paid plan | $5/month for a single-node Postgres database on network-attached storage; PlanetScale Metal with local NVMe starts at $50/month | $10/month for Starter. Pro is $49 and Business $129, each including a larger request allowance. |
| Pricing model | Priced by node size and storage rather than usage, with high-availability clusters sold as a primary plus two replicas | A plan fee plus usage: requests, memory GB-hours, active vCPU-hours and outbound bandwidth are each metered — $1 per million requests beyond the allowance, $0.006 per GB-hour, $0.064 per vCPU-hour, $0.025 per GB out. |
| Storage (entry plan) | First 10 GB free on network-attached storage, then per-GB pricing; storage is included for Metal databases | 500 MB on the free plan across 50 databases. Paid plans raise the database count to 1,000 and beyond. |
| Managed connection pooling | Supported | Supported |
| Engine | PostgreSQL, and MySQL-compatible Vitess clusters with horizontal sharding | PostgreSQL. |
| Backup retention | Automatic backups every 12 hours on production and development branches, retained 2 days by default. Custom schedules and manual backups can set a longer period, and are charged for it. | Daily backups with 7-day retention on Starter and Pro, 30 days on Business. The free plan has none. |

## Where they differ

### Free tier

- PlanetScale: No ([source](https://planetscale.com/pricing.md))
- Prisma Postgres: Yes ([source](https://www.prisma.io/pricing))

### Entry paid plan

- PlanetScale: $5/month for a single-node Postgres database on network-attached storage; PlanetScale Metal with local NVMe starts at $50/month ([source](https://planetscale.com/pricing))
- Prisma Postgres: $10/month for Starter. Pro is $49 and Business $129, each including a larger request allowance. ([source](https://www.prisma.io/pricing))

### Pricing model

- PlanetScale: Priced by node size and storage rather than usage, with high-availability clusters sold as a primary plus two replicas ([source](https://planetscale.com/pricing))
- Prisma Postgres: A plan fee plus usage: requests, memory GB-hours, active vCPU-hours and outbound bandwidth are each metered — $1 per million requests beyond the allowance, $0.006 per GB-hour, $0.064 per vCPU-hour, $0.025 per GB out. ([source](https://www.prisma.io/pricing))

### Storage (entry plan)

- PlanetScale: First 10 GB free on network-attached storage, then per-GB pricing; storage is included for Metal databases ([source](https://planetscale.com/pricing))
- Prisma Postgres: 500 MB on the free plan across 50 databases. Paid plans raise the database count to 1,000 and beyond. ([source](https://www.prisma.io/pricing))

### Engine

- PlanetScale: PostgreSQL, and MySQL-compatible Vitess clusters with horizontal sharding ([source](https://planetscale.com/pricing))
- Prisma Postgres: PostgreSQL. ([source](https://www.prisma.io/pricing))

### Backup retention

- PlanetScale: Automatic backups every 12 hours on production and development branches, retained 2 days by default. Custom schedules and manual backups can set a longer period, and are charged for it. ([source](https://planetscale.com/docs/postgres/backups))
- Prisma Postgres: Daily backups with 7-day retention on Starter and Pro, 30 days on Business. The free plan has none. ([source](https://www.prisma.io/pricing))

## Which should you choose?

Pick PlanetScale if Production workloads that want replicas across availability zones as the default shape rather than an upgrade, and teams who need MySQL-compatible sharding that the Postgres-only services do not offer.

Pick Prisma Postgres if Prisma ORM users who want the database and the client from one vendor, with a pooled connection limit stated per plan rather than left to be discovered.

Consider something else: PlanetScale — You are prototyping. Pricing starts at a node rather than at zero, and there is no free tier documented on the pricing page.

Consider something else: Prisma Postgres — Four separate meters — requests, memory, vCPU and bandwidth — sit on top of the plan fee, so the monthly number is a floor rather than a bill.

## Documented by only one

- Egress over allowance: PlanetScale: 100 GB of egress included, then $0.06/GB
- Startup credit program: Prisma Postgres: Prisma for Startups: database bill covered up to $10,000 for one year, plus 1:1 guidance. Venture-funded track requires pre-seed/seed/Series-A funding raised in the last 12 months and founded in the last 5 years; bootstrapped track requires ≥5k MRR for 6 months and 2 full-time team members.
- Regions: PlanetScale: 19 regions — 12 on AWS (Tokyo, Mumbai, Singapore, Sydney, Montreal, Frankfurt, Dublin, London, São Paulo, N. Virginia, Ohio, Oregon) and 7 on GCP. A branch's region is fixed at creation and changing it means migrating.
- Connection limit: Prisma Postgres: 100 pooled connections on Starter and 10 direct; 10 pooled on Free, 500 on Pro and 1,000 on Business.
- When idle: Prisma Postgres: Scales to zero when idle, and Prisma states an idle app costs nothing.
- Database branching: PlanetScale: Supported
- Point-in-time recovery: PlanetScale: Point-in-time recovery through write-ahead log archiving. WAL is kept for as long as the oldest backup, so the default schedule gives a 2-day window and a longer retention extends it.
- Read replicas: PlanetScale: Supported
- SOC 2: PlanetScale: SOC 1 Type 2 and SOC 2 Type 2 + HIPAA reports, available on all plans on request via PlanetScale's Trust Center.
- HIPAA: PlanetScale: HIPAA-eligible via a Business Associate Agreement for qualifying customers; PlanetScale notes HHS does not recognize a formal HIPAA certification, so compliance is a shared responsibility rather than a badge.
- GDPR / data residency: PlanetScale: Complies with GDPR; data locality follows the AWS/GCP region a database is created in, and EU-region databases keep data in-region unless a read-only replica is added elsewhere.
- PCI DSS: PlanetScale: PlanetScale Managed — the single-tenant product deployed into the customer's own AWS/GCP account — holds a PCI DSS 4.0 Attestation of Compliance as a Level 1 Service Provider. Not documented for the shared multi-tenant product.
- Encryption at rest: PlanetScale: AES encryption at rest on the storage media serving database branches and backups.
- Private networking / VPC: PlanetScale: AWS PrivateLink or GCP Private Service Connect on all plans; PlanetScale Managed on AWS additionally offers fully private network isolation.
- Dedicated infrastructure: PlanetScale: Two single-tenant options: Enterprise single-tenant, deployed into an AWS/GCP account owned by PlanetScale, or PlanetScale Managed, deployed inside the customer's own AWS or GCP account.

## Questions this comparison answers

**Entry paid plan: PlanetScale or Prisma Postgres?**

PlanetScale: $5/month for a single-node Postgres database on network-attached storage; PlanetScale Metal with local NVMe starts at $50/month
Prisma Postgres: $10/month for Starter. Pro is $49 and Business $129, each including a larger request allowance.

**Free tier: PlanetScale or Prisma Postgres?**

PlanetScale: No
Prisma Postgres: Yes

**Storage (entry plan): PlanetScale or Prisma Postgres?**

PlanetScale: First 10 GB free on network-attached storage, then per-GB pricing; storage is included for Metal databases
Prisma Postgres: 500 MB on the free plan across 50 databases. Paid plans raise the database count to 1,000 and beyond.

**Should I choose PlanetScale or Prisma Postgres?**

Pick PlanetScale if Production workloads that want replicas across availability zones as the default shape rather than an upgrade, and teams who need MySQL-compatible sharding that the Postgres-only services do not offer.
Pick Prisma Postgres if Prisma ORM users who want the database and the client from one vendor, with a pooled connection limit stated per plan rather than left to be discovered.