--- title: "Spark is Dead. Long Live DuckDB." url: https://daily.dev/posts/spark-is-dead-long-live-duckdb--83qxe4eu0 source_url: https://www.confessionsofadataguy.com/spark-is-dead-long-live-duckdb type: article source: "Confessions of a Data Guy" published: 2026-05-31T07:44:05.347Z updated: 2026-05-31T08:29:34.363Z tags: ["devops", "data-engineering", "apache-spark", "databricks", "duckdb"] reading_time: 4 upvotes: 0 comments: 0 language: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Spark is Dead. Long Live DuckDB. **[Confessions of a Data Guy](https://daily.dev/sources/confessionsofadataguy)** · 4 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary Apache Spark has peaked and is increasingly dominated by Databricks, which has turned it into a costly, complex enterprise product far removed from its open-source roots. DuckDB is emerging as a simpler, faster, and truly open-source alternative for the vast majority of data pipelines that don't actually need cluster compute. The author argues that most data workloads can be handled in-process with DuckDB — in Lambdas, Python scripts, Airflow jobs — and that the industry's addiction to the Lakehouse model and Databricks pricing will slowly give way to this leaner approach, even if the transition takes decades. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [9 Apache Spark Alternatives You Should Know in 2026](https://daily.dev/posts/9-apache-spark-alternatives-you-should-know-in-2026-eo0oaq4kc) · ITNEXT · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [Why DuckDB is my first choice for data processing](https://daily.dev/posts/why-duckdb-is-my-first-choice-for-data-processing-sx7gglwxx) · Hacker News · 1 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#devops](https://daily.dev/tags/devops), [#data-engineering](https://daily.dev/tags/data-engineering), [#apache-spark](https://daily.dev/tags/apache-spark), [#databricks](https://daily.dev/tags/databricks), [#duckdb](https://daily.dev/tags/duckdb) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/spark-is-dead-long-live-duckdb--83qxe4eu0)