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  "description": "OLTP (Online Transaction Processing) describes the class of database workloads characterised by many short-lived, latency-sensitive transactions: row-level reads and writes that back interactive applications. OLTP contrasts with OLAP (Online Analytical Processing), where queries scan large fractions of historical data for analytics.\n\n\nOLTP characteristics\n\n * Short transactions. A few row reads and writes; complete in milliseconds.\n * High concurrency. Thousands to hundreds of thousands of trans",
  "path": "/engineering-glossary/oltp-online-transaction-processing/",
  "publishedAt": "2026-05-12T18:46:32.000Z",
  "site": "https://sahilkapoor.com",
  "tags": [
    "PostgreSQL",
    "MySQL",
    "MongoDB",
    "ACID",
    "MVCC",
    "SQL"
  ],
  "textContent": "**OLTP (Online Transaction Processing)** describes the class of database workloads characterised by many short-lived, latency-sensitive transactions: row-level reads and writes that back interactive applications. OLTP contrasts with **OLAP (Online Analytical Processing)** , where queries scan large fractions of historical data for analytics.\n\n## OLTP characteristics\n\n  * **Short transactions.** A few row reads and writes; complete in milliseconds.\n  * **High concurrency.** Thousands to hundreds of thousands of transactions per second.\n  * **Row-oriented storage.** Optimised for fetching whole rows quickly.\n  * **ACID guarantees.** Atomicity and isolation matter for business correctness.\n  * **Strict latency SLAs.** User-facing requests demand p99 latency targets.\n\n\n\n## OLTP vs OLAP\n\n| OLTP| OLAP\n---|---|---\nWorkload| Many small reads/writes| Few large scans and aggregations\nStorage| Row-oriented| Column-oriented\nLatency| Milliseconds| Seconds to minutes\nExamples| PostgreSQL, MySQL, DynamoDB| BigQuery, Snowflake, Redshift, ClickHouse, DuckDB\n\nModern **HTAP (Hybrid Transactional/Analytical Processing)** systems like TiDB and SingleStore aim to serve both workloads from one engine.\n\n🔗\n\n**Related Terms**\nPostgreSQL, MySQL, MongoDB, ACID, MVCC, SQL.",
  "title": "OLTP",
  "updatedAt": "2026-05-13T19:14:37.719Z"
}