下表列出了Mysql 主要数据引擎架构(如myisam、innodb Storage Engine )的特性比较:
| Feature | MyISAM | NDB | Archive | InnoDB | Memory |
| Storage Limits | No | Yes | No | 64TB | Yes |
| Transactions | No | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Locking granularity | Table | Row | Row | Row | Table |
| MVCC snapshot read | No | No | No | Yes | No |
| Geospatial support | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | No |
| Data caches | No | Yes | No | Yes | NA |
| Index Caches | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | NA |
| Compressed Data | Yes | No | Yes | No | No |
| Storage cost (relative to other engines) | Small | Med | Small | Med | NA |
| Memory cost (relative to other engines) | Low | High | Low | High | High |
| Bulk insert speed | High | High | Highest | Med | High |
| Replication Support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Foreign Key support | No | No | No | Yes | No |
| Built-in Cluster/High-availability support | No | Yes | No | No | No |
Dynamically add and remove storage engines.
Change the storage engine on a table with “ALTER TABLE …”