Choose an AlloyDB machine type

Choosing the right machine shape for your AlloyDB for PostgreSQL cluster is critical for getting the best performance and cost efficiency for your database workload. This document helps you choose the right machine type by describing the AlloyDB machine series, their intended use cases, and how Google determines where to launch the machine series.

Having a diverse set of machine types lets you customize your AlloyDB instance for your use case, whether you have a massive dataset that benefits from a huge cache, or you have a high-concurrency transactional workload that benefits from the highest number of cores. This flexibility ensures that AlloyDB can support everything from massive, very large database workloads to standard, mission-critical applications.

Machine series overview

AlloyDB offers the following machine series, each built on a different underlying Google Cloud compute platform and optimized for specific performance characteristics.

Machine series	Core platform and CPU	Primary workload focus	Key performance differentiator
N2	3rd Generation Intel x86 (Ice Lake)	Legacy, general purpose	Available in all regions.
C4A	Google Axion ARM	Price performance, high throughput	Provides the best transaction throughput for cache-fitting workloads.
C4	6th generation Intel x86 processors (Granite Rapids) with Titanium SSD.	Low latency or very large database workloads	Provides the largest machine options with local SSDs for the fastest cache.

Machine series availability for AlloyDB clusters

You can choose one of the following machine series:

• N2: this machine series provides a balanced price-to-performance ratio for a variety of AlloyDB workloads.
• C4A Axion-based: this machine series provides optimized price-performance and delivers predictable high performance for high demand AlloyDB workloads.

• C4: this machine series provides excellent performance, and the largest vertical scale in AlloyDB.

Regional availability methodology

AlloyDB helps you deploy and scale high-availability database solutions wherever you need them.

AlloyDB requires high availability (HA) to protect your mission-critical data. This means that to launch any machine series in a given Google Cloud region, the underlying Compute Engine platform supporting that machine series must be available in all three zones within that region. This requirement ensures that when you choose a region for your AlloyDB cluster, the necessary infrastructure is redundant and geographically distributed in that area, which provides the failover capabilities that you need.

Machine series regional deployments

Use the following table to learn where you can find AlloyDB platforms. N2 offers General Availability, and C4A Axion-based offers the widest modern coverage.

N2	C4A	C4
africa-south1	✅	–	–
asia-east1	✅	✅	✅
asia-east2	✅	–	–
asia-northeast1	✅	–	✅
asia-northeast2	✅	–	–
asia-northeast3	✅	–	✅
asia-south1	✅	–	–
asia-south2	✅	–	✅
asia-southeast1	✅	✅	✅
asia-southeast2	✅	–	–
asia-southeast3	✅	–	–
australia-southeast1	✅	–	–
australia-southeast2	✅	–	–
europe-central2	✅	–	–
europe-southwest1	✅	–	–
europe-north1	✅	–	–
europe-north2	✅	–	–
europe-west1	✅	✅	✅
europe-west2	✅	✅	✅
europe-west3	✅	✅	–
europe-west4	✅	✅	✅
europe-west6	✅	–	–
europe-west8	✅	–	–
europe-west9	✅	–	–
europe-west10	✅	–	–
europe-west12	✅	–	–
me-central1	✅	–	–
me-central2	✅	–	–
me-west1	✅	–	–
northamerica-northeast1	✅	–	–
northamerica-northeast2	✅	–	✅
northamerica-south1	✅	–	✅
southamerica-east1	✅	–	–
southamerica-west1	✅	–	–
us-central1	✅	✅	–
us-east1	✅	✅	–
us-east4	✅	✅	✅
us-east5	✅	–	✅
us-east7	✅	–	–
us-south1	✅	–	–
us-west1	✅	–	✅
us-west2	✅	–	–
us-west3	✅	–	✅
us-west4	✅	–	✅

What's next

• Create a cluster and its primary instance .
• Learn about AlloyDB locations .