Apache Kafka vs ksqlDB

Side-by-side comparison of Apache Kafka and ksqlDB to help you choose the right tool.

Feature	Apache Kafka	ksqlDB
Pricing	Free (open source)	Free / Included with Confluent
Rating	⭐ 4.5/5	⭐ 4.3/5
Categories	streaming	streaming
Event streaming	✅	❌
Exactly-once semantics	✅	❌
Kafka Streams	✅	❌
Connect framework	✅	❌
Partitioned logs	✅	❌
Replication	✅	❌
SQL on Kafka	❌	✅
Materialized views	❌	✅
Pull & push queries	❌	✅
Connectors	❌	✅
Windowing	❌	✅
User-defined functions	❌	✅

Distributed event streaming platform

Event streaming database for Kafka

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