Ditching Qdrant for PgVector

In our latest infrastructure update, we decided to transition from Qdrant to pgvector for managing our vector databases. This move is part of our ongoing effort to reduce cost and simplify AAQ’s architecture.

This means: - we no longer require a separate Qdrant server. With the pgvector extension, vector data can now be stored in PostgreSQL along with other transactional data. - Seamless transactions between vector data and transactional data will allow for the integration of new features such as multilingual support.

Why this change?

While Qdrant served us well as a dedicated vector database, integrating it with our existing PostgreSQL setup introduced complexity and maintenance overhead. Operating Qdrant alongside PostgreSQL meant managing two distinct database systems with their own infrastructure, architecture, and requirements. Integrating both databases into our codebase required additional integration layers, complicating our codebase.

As we already were using Postgresql, pgvector caught our attention with this article as a promising solution that integrates vector database capabilities directly into our existing database. Here's why we decided to go for pgvector: - Simplified Architecture: By adopting pgvector, we significantly reduced the complexity of our data infrastructure. Vector and relational data now reside within the same database, eliminating the need for separate systems. - Improved Response Time: Direct integration with PostgreSQL enhances performance by eliminating the overhead of communicating between separate databases.

Moving to pgvector not only benefits our team in terms of reduced complexity and better resource utilization but also lays the groundwork for future innovations such as the multilingual support which should be coming soon.