ApsaraDB for Relational Database Service (known in Alibaba Cloud topics as RDS) is a stable, reliable, and scalable online database service. Based on a distributed file system designed by Alibaba Cloud and incorporated with high-performance SSDs, RDS supports MySQL, SQL Server, PostgreSQL, Postgre Plus Advanced Server (PPAS), and MariaDB engines. It provides a complete database solution that includes backup, recovery, monitoring, migration, and a comprehensive suite of database-optimized functions that allow you to focus on developing better applications.

Learning path

Use RDS Learning Path to learn about concepts and operations of RDS.

Pricing

For more information, see Billing methods and billable items.

How to use RDS

You can create RDS instances, configure the network, create databases, create accounts, and more by using the web console, CLI, SDK, or API, depending on your actual scenario.

• Web console: RDS provides a graphical web console where you can perform operations easily.
• CLI: All operations available on the web console can be performed through the CLI.
• SDK: All operations available on the web console can be performed through the SDK.
• API: All operations available on the web console can be performed through APIs.

After you create an RDS instance, you can access it through any common client, such as MySQL-Front, SSMS (SQL Server Management Studio), or pgAdmin.

Basic concepts

To help familiarize yourself with RDS, the following information describes commonly used terms in RDS:

• Instance: A virtual machine You can create one or more databases in an RDS instance.
• region: A physical data center. Generally, we recommend that your RDS instance and its corresponding ecs instance are located in the same region so that ECS can access RDS within minimal network latency.
• Zone: A physical area that has an independent power supply and networks. A region consists of one or more zones.
• Database engine: The underlying software of a database that enables create, read, update, and delete (CRUD) operations. Database engines supported by RDS are MySQL, SQL Server, PostgreSQL, PPAS (Postgre Plus Advanced Server, highly compatible with Oracle) and MariaDB. For more information, see Database engines.
• Network type: RDS supports the classic network network type and the virtual private cloud (VPC) network type.
• Edition: RDS supports three editions. They are Basic Edition, High-availability Edition, and Cluster (AlwaysOn) Edition. For more information, see RDS editions overview.
• Instance type family: RDS supports the common instance, dedicated instance, or dedicated-host instance types. For more information, see Instance type families.
• storage type: RDS supports local SSDs, standard SSDs, and enhanced SSDs. For more information, see Storage types.

Related services

• ECS: Elastic Compute Service (ECS) is a cloud-based server. An ECS instance can access an RDS instance at the fastest speed if the ECS instance accesses the RDS instance through the intranet. Using both ECS and RDS is a typical service model.
• Redis: Redis is a persistent in-memory database service. If the service volume is large, using ECS, RDS, and Redis can handle more read requests and reduce the response time.
• MongoDB: mongodb is a stable, reliable, and scalable database service that is compatible with the MongoDB protocol. If your business involves different types of data structure, you can store structured data in RDS and unstructured data in MongoDB.
• MaxCompute: MaxCompute (previously known as ODPS) is a general-purpose, fully managed, multi-tenant data processing platform for large-scale data warehousing. MaxCompute supports various data importing solutions and distributed computing models, allowing you to effectively query massive datasets, reduce production costs, and ensure data security. You can use the Data Integration service to import RDS data to MaxCompute for large-scale data processing.
• DTS: You can use Data Transmission Service (dts) to migrate on-premises database to RDS or implement remote disaster recovery of RDS.
• OSS: object storage service (oss) is an encrypted, secure, cost-effective, and easy-to-use object storage service that enables you to store, back up, and archive large amounts of data in the cloud.