Best of MySQLJanuary 2026

  1. 1
    Article
    Avatar of bytebytegoByteByteGo·19w

    How Uber Serves over 150 Million Reads per Second from Integrated Cache

    Uber's CacheFront system serves over 150 million database reads per second using Redis while maintaining strong consistency. The system uses a three-layer architecture with Query Engine, Storage Engine, and integrated caching. Initial challenges included cache invalidation delays and stale data from conditional updates. Uber solved this by implementing soft deletes, monotonic timestamps, and synchronous write-path invalidation alongside asynchronous CDC (Flux) and TTL expiration. This triple-defense strategy achieves 99.9%+ cache hit rates with near-zero stale values, even with 24-hour TTLs.

  2. 2
    Article
    Avatar of devclassDEVCLASS·19w

    Open source MySQL repository has no commits in more than three months • DEVCLASS

    MySQL's GitHub repository has seen no commits since September 2025, coinciding with reported Oracle layoffs in the MySQL team. Commit activity has declined yearly since 2019, reaching its lowest point in 2025 since the project began. Industry experts suggest Oracle is focusing on proprietary MySQL versions (Enterprise, Cluster, Heatwave) while neglecting the open source community edition. Despite concerns, MySQL remains the second most popular database among professional developers according to Stack Overflow surveys, though PostgreSQL now leads. Experts recommend migrating to alternatives like MariaDB or PostgreSQL, though migration can be challenging due to SQL dialect differences.

  3. 3
    Article
    Avatar of stitcherstitcher.io·17w

    Once again processing 11 million rows, now in seconds

    A PHP developer optimizes a script processing 11 million database events, improving performance from 50k to 1.7M events per second through incremental changes. Key optimizations include combining SQL inserts, moving calculations from MySQL to PHP, eliminating object instantiation in favor of raw arrays, and removing JSON deserialization by using direct database columns. The journey demonstrates the trade-offs between code convenience and raw performance, with the final implementation processing data in seconds rather than days.

  4. 4
    Article
    Avatar of lobstersLobsters·18w

    Stop using MySQL in 2026, it is not true open source

    MySQL's development has significantly declined under Oracle's stewardship, with commit activity dropping sharply in 2025 and staff reductions announced. Oracle conducts all development behind closed doors, rejecting community contributions and treating MySQL as open source only by license, not practice. Technical issues have plagued recent releases, including data corruption bugs, performance regressions of 15%, and difficult upgrade paths. Oracle published 123 CVEs in 2025 with minimal transparency compared to MariaDB's 8. Migration to MariaDB is straightforward for most applications, offering true open source development with active community participation. Major platforms like Wikipedia and 57% of WordPress sites already use MariaDB.