Overview
BigQuery is Google Cloud's fully managed, serverless data warehouse. It separates storage and compute, scales automatically, and requires zero infrastructure management. Known for blazing fast queries on petabyte-scale data and tight integration with Google's ecosystem.
Key Features
- ✓ Serverless: No infrastructure to manage
- ✓ Columnar Storage: Optimized for analytical queries
- ✓ BigQuery ML: Train ML models with SQL
- ✓ Streaming Inserts: Real-time data ingestion
- ✓ BI Engine: In-memory analysis for dashboards
- ✓ Federated Queries: Query external sources directly
Pros
- 👍 True serverless (pay per query)
- 👍 Handles petabyte scale effortlessly
- 👍 Excellent price/performance ratio
- 👍 Strong Google ecosystem integration
- 👍 Generous free tier (1TB queries/month)
- 👍 BigQuery ML is genuinely useful
Cons
- 👎 Slot-based pricing is confusing
- 👎 Can get expensive with heavy use
- 👎 Less ecosystem than Snowflake
- 👎 Google lock-in concerns
- 👎 Some SQL dialect differences
Best For
Google Cloud shops, teams wanting serverless simplicity, and anyone with variable query patterns who benefits from pay-per-query pricing.
Founded: 2010 HQ: Google Cloud