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Data platform · Platform Concepts

OLTP vs OLAP

Easyplatform-20
OLTPOLAPworkloadsarchitecture

Question

What is the difference between OLTP and OLAP?

Solution

OLTP (Online Transaction Processing) systems run the business: take orders, update inventory, charge cards. They optimize for many small reads/writes with strong consistency.

OLAP (Online Analytical Processing) systems analyze the business: revenue by region, funnel metrics, cohort retention. They optimize for large scans and aggregations.

OLTP:  UPDATE orders SET status='paid' WHERE id=123;   -- milliseconds
OLAP:  SELECT region, sum(amount) FROM fct_orders
       WHERE order_date >= '2026-01-01' GROUP BY 1;   -- heavy aggregate

Platform implication

Do not run heavy analytics on the primary OLTP database. Replicate/CDC/ETL into a warehouse or lakehouse.

Interview tip: Contrast workload shape (point lookups vs aggregates) and why separation protects production apps.

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