Hadoop is an open-source distributed computing framework for batch processing large datasets across clusters, while Snowflake is a cloud-native data warehouse optimized for SQL queries and real-time analytics. Snowflake offers faster query performance and easier management, while Hadoop provides greater flexibility and lower long-term costs for organizations with large data infrastructure investments.
Hadoop vs Snowflake — Side-by-side comparison on A Versus B
Open-source distributed computing framework for batch processing large-scale data across clusters
Cloud-native SQL data warehouse with independent compute and storage scaling for fast analytics
Architecture. Query Speed (10TB dataset). Infrastructure Cost (annual, 100TB). Setup & Management Complexity. Compute & Storage Separation. SQL Support. Time to First Query (deployment)
Choose Hadoop if you have massive unstructured data volumes, existing infrastructure investments, and technical teams capable of managing distributed systems—the lower long-term costs justify the complexity. Choose Snowflake if you prioritize fast time-to-insight, ease of management, real-time analytics, and are willing to pay cloud costs for elimination of DevOps overhead and superior query performance.
Total Cost of Ownership (5 years, 100TB)
Apache Hadoop: 28-84 days | Snowflake: 15 minutes
Apache Hadoop: 5-10 FTE | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 20-50 ms | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: Limited by cluster (typically 10-100 PB) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 24-72 hours | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 95-99% (cluster-dependent) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: $12,500-$25,000 | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 180-3600 seconds | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 100K-500K | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 3-5 nodes | Snowflake: 1 (virtual warehouse)
Apache Hadoop: 2 (Java, Scala) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: Task re-execution + HDFS replication | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 100+ GB batches | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 300-600 seconds (disk-based) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 8-12 weeks | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 1x (baseline) | Snowflake: N/A
Monthly Cost (100GB monthly data ingestion, 1,000 compute hours)
Apache Hadoop: $2,500-5,000 (infrastructure only) | Snowflake: N/A
Required Team Skills (FTE equivalents for operations)
Apache Hadoop: 2-3 dedicated engineers | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: Hive SQL (65% ANSI) | Snowflake: N/A
Query Latency (median, standard ETL workload)
Apache Hadoop: 45-120 seconds | Snowflake: N/A
Built-in Collaboration Tools (notebooks, dashboards, repos)
Apache Hadoop: 0 (requires third-party) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 10-30 seconds (with Spark) | Snowflake: N/A
Infrastructure Cost (Annual, 50TB dataset)
Apache Hadoop: $150,000-$250,000 | Snowflake: N/A
Infrastructure Cost (Annual, 500TB dataset)
Apache Hadoop: $200,000-$400,000 | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 30-90 days (cluster + network + security) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 90% (native HDFS support for any file type) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 40-80 hours (patching, monitoring, scaling) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: Complete (on-premises or self-managed cloud) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 10,000+ (custom hardware limits) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 300-600 seconds | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: Java, Scala | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: Not supported | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: $180,000-250,000 | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: Replication (3x copies) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 3 weeks | Snowflake: 0.1 weeks (24 hours)
Apache Hadoop: 120-300 seconds | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: $150,000-$400,000 | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 6-12 months | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 4+ (batch, streaming, graph, ML) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: Unlimited (cluster-dependent) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: Low (portable open-source) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 4-8 weeks | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 1x (MapReduce baseline) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 15-45 seconds (Hive) | Snowflake: N/A
Annual Cost (100TB/year, 5-node baseline)
Apache Hadoop: $180,000-$250,000 | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: No (requires Ranger) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: Manual (requires YARN configuration) | Snowflake: N/A
Collaborative Notebooks with Version Control
Apache Hadoop: No (requires Jupyter/Git separately) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: Yes (full control) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: $150,000-$300,000 | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 4-8 (DevOps, engineers, admins) | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 50-100 per cluster | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: $12-20 | Snowflake: $23 (on-demand)
Apache Hadoop: 40-60% reduction in network I/O | Snowflake: N/A
Apache Hadoop: 5 (full MapReduce/Spark) | Snowflake: N/A
Query Performance (10TB TPC-DS benchmark)
Apache Hadoop: 95 seconds | Snowflake: 5 seconds
Apache Hadoop: $120,000 | Snowflake: $200,000
Apache Hadoop: Tightly coupled (scale together) | Snowflake: Fully independent (separate pricing)
Apache Hadoop: Hive SQL (SQL92, limited optimizations) | Snowflake: ANSI SQL with advanced optimizations
Apache Hadoop: Manual snapshots only | Snowflake: 90 days automatic
Apache Hadoop: 3-5 engineers | Snowflake: 0.5 engineers
Apache Hadoop: 14,200 stars | Snowflake: 2,800 stars
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: $2,000-$5,000
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 1-3 days
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Structured (Parquet, CSV, JSON)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Snowflake Marketplace (proprietary)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: SQL primarily
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: $2-4 per credit
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 3 (AWS, Azure, GCP)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 20-30 minutes
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Limited by warehouse size
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 1,000+ datasets
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Limited by warehouse size, manual tuning
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: $200-500
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: AWS, Azure, GCP
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 2-4 seconds
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Native, cross-account/cross-cloud
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Complete separation
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Available (instant, free)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 1-3 weeks
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 30 seconds
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 100,000 events/sec
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 4:1 to 8:1
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Consumption-based (compute + storage)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 3/10 (very easy)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: <5 seconds
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 30-120 seconds
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 0.3-0.5 weeks (1-2 days)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: $120,000-180,000
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Up to 50+ PB (cloud limits)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: SQL, Python, Java, JavaScript, Scala
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 1-2 years (SQL knowledge)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Yes (sub-second latency)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: $240,000
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Unlimited
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 8 (Parquet, CSV, JSON, ORC, AVRO, XML, PDF, Images)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Cloud-only (SaaS)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 1,000-10,000ms
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Batch-based (bulk loading)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 95% (full ANSI)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: ~10,000 enterprises
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: $10,000-1,000,000 (credits-based)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 3-15 (depends on data size)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Unlimited (petabyte-scale)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 3/10 (managed cloud service)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 2-5 seconds
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: $120-240
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Limited (external integration required)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Structured (optimized for tables/CSV/JSON)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Unlimited (multi-cluster shared warehouse)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 5-10 minutes
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 32% of cloud data warehouse market
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 2.8x baseline (external ML tools required)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 38 seconds
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: $4.00-$6.00 (Medium warehouse)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: ~14 seconds
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: ~1 (auto-scaling, no downtime)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Up to 20%
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 4-8 (clustering hints optional)
Starting Monthly Cost (10GB active data)
SQL Query Performance (TPC-DS Benchmark)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Cortex AI (basic)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: High (proprietary format)
Maximum Concurrent Queries Per Warehouse
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 8-128 (warehouse-dependent)
Annual TCO (100TB storage, average usage)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: $260,000
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 10-15 hours
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: Independent scaling
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: None (on-demand only)
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: ANSI SQL compliant
Apache Hadoop: N/A | Snowflake: 5 (account creation)
How to choose between Apache Hadoop and Snowflake
Hadoop vs Snowflake — Structured Comparison Data
Machine-readable comparison dataset for Hadoop vs Snowflake. Contains 162 attribute comparisons, 5 FAQ pairs.
Hadoop vs Snowflake — Attribute Category Vocabulary
Taxonomy of attribute categories used to classify comparison data for Hadoop vs Snowflake.
When should I choose Hadoop over Snowflake?
Choose Hadoop if you process petabyte-scale unstructured data, require on-premises deployment for compliance, have existing Hadoop ecosystem investments, or need absolute cost minimization for large sustained workloads. Hadoop excels at batch processing (ETL pipelines, log analysis, machine learning training) where latency isn't critical.
Is Snowflake worth the higher costs compared to Hadoop?
Yes, if your organization values time-to-insight, operational simplicity, and analyst productivity. Snowflake users typically reduce time-to-query by 90%, eliminate 3-5 DevOps FTE (saving $300K-500K annually), and accelerate analytics projects by 6-12 months. For 50+ concurrent business users, Snowflake's managed service model breaks even against Hadoop's operational costs.
Can I use both Hadoop and Snowflake together?
Yes, many organizations use a hybrid approach: Hadoop for massive-scale ETL and data preparation, then load processed data into Snowflake for fast business analytics and reporting. This leverages Hadoop's cost efficiency for heavy lifting and Snowflake's query speed for BI. However, this adds operational complexity and maintenance overhead.
What's the difference in data format support?
Hadoop works with any format (structured, unstructured, binary) but requires explicit schema-on-read interpretation. Snowflake natively supports structured (Parquet, CSV) and semi-structured (JSON, XML, Avro) data without preprocessing, and can query nested JSON directly without flattening—a significant productivity advantage for modern data sources.
How does query performance scale as data grows?
Hadoop's query performance degrades significantly as data volume increases (linear scaling with cluster size required). Snowflake maintains consistent sub-second to sub-10-second query performance even at petabyte scale due to its columnar architecture and automatic micro-partitioning. For queries on 100TB+, Snowflake is typically 20-50x faster than Hadoop.
How to Choose Between Apache Hadoop and Snowflake
Architecture: Apache Hadoop has Distributed computing framework (MapReduce-based), while Snowflake has Cloud-native SQL data warehouse (MPP).
Query Speed (10TB dataset): Apache Hadoop has 45-120 seconds, while Snowflake has 2-8 seconds.
Consider: Infrastructure Cost (annual, 100TB)
Infrastructure Cost (annual, 100TB): Apache Hadoop has $80,000-150,000, while Snowflake has $150,000-250,000.
Setup & Management Complexity: Apache Hadoop has High (requires DevOps expertise), while Snowflake has Low (managed service).
Compute & Storage Separation: Apache Hadoop has Tightly coupled, while Snowflake has Independent scaling.
SQL Support: Apache Hadoop has Limited (Hive SQL, slower), while Snowflake has Native ANSI SQL support.
Consider: Time to First Query (deployment)
Time to First Query (deployment): Apache Hadoop has 2-4 weeks, while Snowflake has 24-48 hours.