On this page
Short answer
Short answer
PostgreSQL has no license fee and puts partitioning, parallel query, logical replication, JSONB and a large extension ecosystem in the standard distribution. Oracle is priced per processor or per user, and capabilities such as Partitioning, Real Application Clusters, Active Data Guard and Advanced Compression are separately priced options on top of Enterprise Edition. On Oracle's price list dated 15 September 2026, Enterprise Edition is $47,500 per processor license plus $10,450 a year for Software Update License and Support. Moving is a project measured in PL/SQL, not in tables, so stay on Oracle when the estate depends on RAC, Exadata, Oracle application suites or a large body of PL/SQL whose conversion would cost more than the license saving.
PostgreSQL vs Oracle Database on the same criteria
| PostgreSQL | Oracle Database | |
|---|---|---|
| License | PostgreSQL License, a liberal open source license similar to BSD or MIT. No per-core or per-user fee | Commercial. Enterprise Edition is counted per processor (cores times Oracle's core factor) or per Named User Plus. Standard Edition 2 is counted per occupied socket |
| List price, Enterprise Edition (Oracle price list, 15 Sep 2026) | $0 for the software. Cost is people, hosting and support | $47,500 per processor plus $10,450 a year for Software Update License and Support, before discounts |
| Partitioning, replication and compression | Declarative partitioning, streaming and logical replication in the standard distribution | Partitioning $11,500, Active Data Guard $11,500 and Advanced Compression $11,500 per processor, each an option on Enterprise Edition |
| Procedural language | PL/pgSQL, similar to PL/SQL. No packages and no autonomous transactions. Procedures can COMMIT since PostgreSQL 11 | PL/SQL with packages, autonomous transactions and a large library of built-in packages |
| High availability | Streaming and logical replication built in. Automatic failover comes from tools such as Patroni or repmgr. No shared-storage active-active cluster | Data Guard standby. Real Application Clusters ($23,000 per processor option) for shared-storage active-active |
| Diagnostics and tuning | pg_stat_statements, EXPLAIN, auto_explain and pg_stat_activity, plus third-party monitoring | AWR, ASH and SQL tuning tools, licensed through Diagnostics Pack ($7,500 per processor) and Tuning Pack ($5,000) |
| Encryption and security | Row-level security, TLS and SCRAM. The community project does not ship transparent data encryption | Transparent Data Encryption through Advanced Security ($15,000 per processor). Database Vault and Label Security are separate options |
| Version support | 5 years per major version. PostgreSQL 18 (September 2025) to 14 November 2030 | 19c Long Term Support: Premier Support to December 2029, Extended Support to December 2032. 26ai Long Term Support: Premier Support to December 2031 |
| Managed cloud | Amazon RDS and Aurora, Google Cloud SQL and AlloyDB, Azure Database for PostgreSQL | Oracle Cloud, Amazon RDS for Oracle, Exadata Cloud, and on-premises |
| Wins when | New builds, cost pressure, extensions such as PostGIS and pgvector, cloud-native deployment | RAC or Exadata estates, deep PL/SQL, Oracle application suites, or conversion that costs more than the saving |
Licensing: what Oracle's price list says and what PostgreSQL costs
PostgreSQL is released under the PostgreSQL License, which permits use, copying, modification and distribution for any purpose without a fee. Companies sell distributions, managed services and support around it, but there is no licensed edition of the database itself. The cost of PostgreSQL is the people who run it, the hosting, and any support contract.
Oracle prices Enterprise Edition per processor. The number of licenses is the total cores multiplied by the factor in Oracle's Processor Core Factor Table, rounded up. Standard Edition 2 counts a processor as an occupied socket. Named User Plus is the alternative metric. Options are priced on top, at the same metric. These are list prices from Oracle's Technology Global Price List dated 15 September 2026 and negotiated prices differ:
| Item | Per processor | Annual support per processor | Per Named User Plus |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard Edition 2 | $17,500 | $3,850 | $350 |
| Enterprise Edition | $47,500 | $10,450 | $950 |
| Partitioning | $11,500 | $2,530 | $230 |
| Active Data Guard | $11,500 | $2,530 | $230 |
| Advanced Compression | $11,500 | $2,530 | $230 |
| Real Application Clusters | $23,000 | $5,060 | $460 |
| Database In-Memory | $23,000 | $5,060 | $460 |
| Diagnostics Pack | $7,500 | $1,650 | $150 |
| Tuning Pack | $5,000 | $1,100 | $100 |
A worked example of the list price
Take one server with 16 x86 cores, and assume a core factor of 0.5, the factor Oracle's table lists for most x86 processors (check the table for your CPU). That needs 8 processor licenses. Enterprise Edition at list is 8 x $47,500 = $380,000 once, plus 8 x $10,450 = $83,600 a year. Add Partitioning and the one-time figure rises by 8 x $11,500 = $92,000 and the annual figure by 8 x $2,530 = $20,240. The same server running PostgreSQL has no database license line at all. That is the saving. The cost on the other side is the conversion and testing project, which depends on the amount of PL/SQL and not on the price list.
PL/SQL vs PL/pgSQL
PL/pgSQL is deliberately close to PL/SQL, which is why simple procedures convert with little change. The gaps are where the work is. PostgreSQL has no packages, so package bodies become schemas holding functions and package-level state needs a new home. It has no autonomous transactions, so audit and logging routines that commit independently have to be redesigned or emulated. Oracle rolls back only the failing statement on an error, while PostgreSQL aborts the whole transaction until a savepoint, which changes how application retry logic must behave. Empty strings are NULL in Oracle and are distinct values in PostgreSQL.
Tools such as Ora2Pg and the AWS Schema Conversion Tool handle the mechanical part. Ora2Pg's own documentation describes its PL/SQL conversion as basic and says the generated code has to be reviewed.
High availability and scaling: RAC, Data Guard and PostgreSQL replication
Oracle offers two distinct things. Data Guard keeps a standby database in step and fails over to it. Real Application Clusters runs several instances against shared storage so that all of them accept work. PostgreSQL has no equivalent of the second. Scalability works differently: PostgreSQL scales reads with replicas, writes go to one primary, and failover is automated outside the core by tools such as Patroni or repmgr. For most transactional systems a primary with synchronous or asynchronous standbys is enough. For a system that needs active-active writes against one database image, that is a design change, not a configuration setting.
Support lifecycles: PostgreSQL vs Oracle
The PostgreSQL Global Development Group supports each major version for five years after its first release, then ships a final minor release. As of 31 October 2026, PostgreSQL 18 runs to 14 November 2030, 17 to 8 November 2029 and 14 ends on 12 November 2026.
Oracle's Lifetime Support Policy for technology products, effective 2 October 2026, lists Oracle Database 19c as a Long Term Support Release with Premier Support to December 2029 and Extended Support to December 2032, and Oracle Database 26ai Enterprise Edition as a Long Term Support Release with Premier Support to December 2031 and Extended Support still to be decided. The same policy notes that, from May 2027, support for 19c excludes Java 8 related third-party software, which the policy says primarily affects the AIX, zLinux, HP-UX, Solaris and Windows ports.
When to stay on Oracle
- RAC or Exadata is doing real work. If the workload needs active-active writes on shared storage, or relies on Exadata offload, PostgreSQL is a re-architecture and not a swap.
- The application is an Oracle product. E-Business Suite, PeopleSoft, JD Edwards and similar suites are supported by their vendor on Oracle Database, and AceMQ covers the database, not those applications.
- A large body of PL/SQL that nobody can test. If thousands of procedures hold the business rules and there is no regression suite, the conversion cost can exceed the license saving. Writing the tests first is itself a project.
- The renewal is already well negotiated. An existing agreement at a deep discount changes the arithmetic, and so does a contract that ends in a few years.
- The team's skill is Oracle and nothing is changing. A working, supported system is not a reason to migrate by itself.
Move when there is a reason beyond preference: a renewal you cannot justify, a platform standard, a need for PostGIS or pgvector, or a cloud move where the managed service is the natural target. Then assess first, convert one database end to end, and decide the rest from what that shows.
Support for PostgreSQL after the move
AceMQ supports PostgreSQL on any current version, self-managed or cloud-hosted: see PostgreSQL support for 24/7 cover, or managed PostgreSQL services if you want the platform run for you.
How we compared
We compared the two databases on ten criteria: license, list price, partitioning and replication, procedural language, high availability, diagnostics, security, version support, managed cloud, and when each wins. Oracle's figures come from its own documents: the Oracle Technology Global Price List dated 15 September 2026 and the Oracle Lifetime Support Policy for technology products effective 2 October 2026, both read on 31 October 2026. PostgreSQL's come from the project's license and versioning policy, read the same day. List prices are not what a customer pays, support dates change with each policy revision, and Oracle licensing depends on contract terms we have not seen, so confirm both with Oracle for the estate you run.
Frequently asked questions
Is PostgreSQL better than Oracle?
Not in general. PostgreSQL has no license fee and a broad extension ecosystem, and covers most transactional workloads. Oracle has features PostgreSQL lacks, notably Real Application Clusters, Exadata integration and a mature PL/SQL package model. Choose on the workload, the licensing position and the cost of converting existing code.
Is PostgreSQL really free?
The software is: the PostgreSQL License permits use, modification and distribution for any purpose without a fee. You still pay for the people who run it, the hosting, and optionally a support contract or a managed service.
How much does Oracle Enterprise Edition cost?
On Oracle's Technology Global Price List dated 15 September 2026, Enterprise Edition is $47,500 per processor license plus $10,450 a year for support, or $950 per Named User Plus. Options such as Partitioning ($11,500) and Real Application Clusters ($23,000) are priced on top. These are list prices before discounts.
Can PostgreSQL replace Oracle RAC?
Not as a like-for-like swap. PostgreSQL has no shared-storage active-active cluster. It uses a primary with streaming replicas and automated failover from tools such as Patroni, which is enough for most transactional systems but is a different design.
How difficult is it to migrate from Oracle to PostgreSQL?
Tables and indexes convert quickly with tools such as Ora2Pg. The difficulty is PL/SQL: packages, autonomous transactions, empty-string semantics and error behavior all differ. Convert and test one database end to end first, then plan the rest from what that shows.
When does Oracle Database 19c support end?
Under Oracle's Lifetime Support Policy effective 2 October 2026, 19c has Premier Support to December 2029 and Extended Support to December 2032. Confirm against Oracle's current policy before planning around it.
