Difference between Oracle and MySQL

Key difference: The Oracle Database is an object-relational database management system (ORDBMS). MySQL is an open source relational database management system (RDBMS). MySQL is the world's most used RDBMS, and runs as a server providing multi-user access to a number of databases.

Both the Oracle Database and MySQL are database management systems currently produced and managed by the Oracle Corporation. The Oracle Corporation is a multinational computer technology corporation based in Redwood City, California, USA. It specializes in developing and marketing computer hardware systems and enterprise software products. The company also builds tools for database development and systems of middle-tier software, enterprise resource planning software (ERP), customer relationship management software (CRM) and supply chain management (SCM) software.

The Oracle Database is an object-relational database management system (ORDBMS). It is commonly referred to as Oracle RDBMS or simply as Oracle. Software Development Laboratories (SDL) developed the original version of the Oracle software.

MySQL is an open source relational database management system (RDBMS). MySQL is officially pronounced as "My S-Q-L", but it is also called "My Sequel". It is named after co-founder Michael Widenius' daughter, My. SQL stands for Structured Query Language. MySQL is the world's most used RDBMS, and runs as a server providing multi-user access to a number of databases. MySQL was owned and sponsored by a single for-profit firm, the Swedish company MySQL AB, which is now owned by Oracle Corporation.

MySQL is a popular choice of database for use in web applications. It is a central component of the widely used ‘LAMP’ open source web application software stack, as well as other AMP stacks. LAMP stands for "Linux, Apache, MySQL, Perl/PHP/Python." MySQL is often used by free-software-open source projects that require a full-featured database management system, such as TYPO3, Joomla, WordPress, phpBB, MyBB, Drupal, etc. MySQL is also used in many high-profile, large-scale World Wide Web products, including Wikipedia, Google, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Nokia.com, and YouTube.

The main difference between Oracle and MySQL is the fact that MySQL is open source, while Oracle is not. However, Oracle is considered to be much more powerful a software than MySQL.

Further differences between Oracle and MySQL:

Oracle offers inline views, role based security, advanced replication, etc., while MySQL does not.
Oracle supports the creation of programs that are embedded within the database by way of a procedural language and can be executed independently or triggered by certain events.
Oracle is better for large scale deployments as it has extensive capabilities.
Most editions of oracle have high licensing costs, which are needed in order to use the software. Oracle Express is freely available.
MySQL is a free open source program; hence it is in easy reach of ordinary web publishers and small businesses.
MySQL is provided under the GNU GPL license that basically means that anyone can use as long as any other work derived from it is shared under the same license.
Oracle is often limited to huge companies.
Oracle Support Pl-SQL, in addition to SQL. MySQL support only SQL
Oracle provides security features such as row lock while MySQL provides column lock.
Oracle requires username, password, and profile validation at the time of logging while Mysql requires only username, password and host.
Oracle9i Database supports the use of temporary tables for an individual session, or global to all users.
Mysql is light, reliable and can connect to multi-Client Program.
MySQL does not support data partitions, and requires a server for each set of data files. Scalability is limited to the size of a single server.
Compared to Oracle, MySQL does not have Tablespace, Role management, snapshots, synonym and packages.