BASE Paradigm vs ACID Paradigm — Quick Contrast

AspectACID (RDBMS)BASE (Many NoSQL / AP systems)
Consistency styleImmediate, strong (linearizable)Eventual or tunable; anomalies allowed
Availability goalMay block/abort to preserve integrityFavors answers over perfect answers
SchemaRigid, enforced before writeFlexible/implicit, often JSON or key–value
Typical scale pathVertical first, manual sharding laterHorizontal out‑of‑the‑box
Suitable workloadsFinancial ledger, inventory, bookingsSocial feeds, IoT metrics, shopping carts
Failure modelPrefer safety, fail‑stopPrefer liveness, self‑heal & merge

Mnemonic: ACID protects the money, BASE powers the massive feed.