🗄️ Database Design / Normalization
Intermediate
What is the difference between OLTP and OLAP?
Answer
OLTP (Online Transaction Processing) handles real-time, high-volume, short transactional queries — INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE of individual records. Optimized for write performance, normalized schema, and low latency. Examples: order placement, banking transactions, user authentication. OLAP (Online Analytical Processing) handles complex analytical queries over large datasets — aggregations, grouping, historical analysis. Optimized for read performance, often uses denormalized star/snowflake schemas, and benefits from columnar storage. Examples: business intelligence dashboards, sales reporting, trend analysis. Many organizations have separate OLTP (production database) and OLAP (data warehouse) systems.
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