MongoDB: a data-backed look

MongoDB overview

MongoDB is a document-oriented NoSQL database that stores data in flexible, JSON-like documents. It combines automatic replication, sharding, and indexing to support high-throughput applications.

Whether running on-premise or in the Atlas cloud service, MongoDB offers built-in data distribution, backup, and monitoring tools. Developers benefit from an intuitive query language, while operations teams gain visibility through integrated metrics and alerts.

How much do businesses spend on MongoDB?

The chart below illustrates average quarterly spending on MongoDB across different business sizes.

Mid-market and enterprise organizations exhibit the highest spending levels, with consistent growth across all quarters. Starting with a substantial investment, spending increased steadily and accelerated significantly in the final quarter. This suggests expanding database requirements and adoption of additional MongoDB features as applications scale.

Small and medium-sized businesses exhibit moderate spending, with steady growth, and maintain relatively stable investment through the first three quarters before increasing notably by year-end. This indicates a gradual expansion of the database and adoption of features as development needs grow.

Micro businesses maintain the most consistent spending pattern with minimal fluctuation. This stability suggests predictable database usage and controlled feature adoption, making MongoDB a budget-friendly solution for smaller development teams.

Who is MongoDB best for?

The chart below breaks down MongoDB's user base by industry and business sizes.

Micro businesses represent the largest segment, at nearly half of all customers, demonstrating MongoDB's strong appeal to startups and small development teams seeking flexible document-based database solutions.

Small and medium-sized businesses account for over one-third of users, underscoring MongoDB's effectiveness in serving growing teams that require scalable document databases for evolving applications.

Mid-market and enterprise companies comprise about one-fifth of the user base. While a smaller portion of total customers, these larger organizations likely contribute disproportionately to revenue given their significantly higher spending patterns.

This distribution reveals MongoDB's positioning as an accessible database platform serving development teams across all organizational sizes.

MongoDB key features

Flexible document model

• What it does: Stores data as JSON-like documents with dynamic schemas, allowing fields to vary between documents.
• Key benefit: Adapts to changing application requirements without costly schema migrations, reducing development time.

Horizontal scaling and sharding

• What it does: Divides data into multiple shards that distribute documents across separate servers based on a shard key.
• Key benefit: Handles large data sets and high traffic by automatically scaling out, maintaining performance as demand grows.

Aggregation framework

• What it does: Processes data through a pipeline of stages, such as filtering, grouping, and sorting, to perform real-time analytics.
• Key benefit: Enables complex data transformations and reporting without external ETL tools, consolidating workloads in the database.

Built-in replication and high availability

• What it does: Creates replica sets with primary and secondary nodes, automatically failing over if the primary node goes offline.
• Key benefit: Ensures minimal downtime and data redundancy, maintaining application availability during maintenance or outages.

Atlas cloud service

• What it does: Provides a managed MongoDB environment with automated backups, patching, and global distribution via cloud providers.
• Key benefit: Reduces operational burden by handling infrastructure management, letting teams focus on development rather than database maintenance.

Indexing and query optimization

• What it does: Supports single-field, compound, text, geospatial, and wildcard indexes to optimize query performance.
• Key benefit: Improves read speeds and reduces latency by directing the database to relevant documents, essential for real-time applications.

MongoDB pricing

MongoDB pros and cons

MongoDB is a good fit if:

• You need a flexible schema to store and query evolving data structures.
• Your applications require horizontal scaling to handle large volumes of reads and writes.
• You want built-in replication and high availability without managing multiple tools.
• You value a document model that aligns with modern application development patterns.

Consider alternatives if:

• You need strict ACID guarantees across multiple tables in every transaction.
• Your data is highly structured with fixed schemas and complex relational joins.
• You want an embedded database for lightweight local applications.
• Your use case focuses on analytics and would benefit from columnar data storage.