15+ Advantages of DBMS

A database management system, or DBMS, is defined as a software system that helps users define, create and/or maintain a database, as well as manage control access to related data. DBMS software includes a number of programs to help the primary user control the database, while allowing other users to define, create, edit, store, or retrieve information from the database within the DBMS environment. 

Database Management System (DBMS) has several significant advantages as compared to the previous data management approaches. With such advantages, DBMS effectively overcomes the problems of existing traditional file processing systems.

In this article, we discuss some of the major advantages of DBMS (Database Management System). These advantages will certainly help people or organizations to understand why they should upgrade to a database management system from a traditional file system or other data management approach.

Advantages of DBMS refer to all such activities, actions, or benefits that make DBMS more useful and helpful as compared to the traditional file-based system or its predecessors. Due to many benefits, applications of DBMS can be seen in almost all major industries or sectors like banking, education, finance, medicine, defense, telecommunication, etc. 

Let us discuss some of the most common advantages of a database management system in detail:

DBMS Advantages List [Show/ Hide] • Simplicity • Data Integration • Data Migration • Data Access • Decision Making • Backup & Recovery • Data Sharing • Data Integrity • Data Security • Data Privacy • Data Concurrency • Data Redundancy • Data Inconsistency • Low Maintenance • Multi-Access Support • End-user Productivity

Although it sounds complicated, a database management system is somewhat easy to learn. It presents a simple, clean and straightforward conceptual or logical view of the data. With some effort, users can easily learn how to implement or perform basic operations such as inserting, creating, or deleting data or files in a database.

Data integration refers to the process of combining data residing at different locations and then presenting it to the user with a unified view. With DBMS, we usually get access to well-managed, organized, and synchronized data. Extensive access to well-managed data promotes an integrated view of the organization’s operations, making it easy to understand. Apart from this, it also helps in keeping track of how one segment of the company affects other segments.

Data migration refers to the process of moving or transferring data from one storage system to another when changing/upgrading storage, database, or application. DBMS allows users to take advantage of database migration services and migrate their data from other file-based systems or databases to database management systems.

Once the migration is complete, the data in the source location remains the same, although a copy is made or even structured in the target DBMS database as well.

With a DBMS, searching and accessing data is much easier and faster. Unlike traditional file approaches, we don’t need to write an individual program for each specific search. Instead, DBMS enables us to write some small queries and search the database for related information without wasting much time. 

Database management systems typically provide quick answers to such queries (or queries) and make access to data very fast and exceptionally accurate. This is one of the biggest benefits as we can quickly search and retrieve any specific information that may be needed in an emergency.

For example, end-users may use queries such as the following:

• What is the profit of the previous month?

• What is the increase in sales in the last month?

• How many customers have a credit score above 790?

With DBMS, the management of data as well as access to the data has been greatly improved. This can help in extracting better quality information in no time, which can further help in taking necessary or quality decisions. Quality decision-making can definitely lead any organization towards success or growth.

The database management system is designed in such a way that it can handle backup and recovery automatically. DBMS takes care of the data and creates backup copies from time to time. If there is any uncertainty or system failure, the DBMS restores the most recent backup copy to keep the DBMS running. 

Apart from this, users can also take a backup of the database and keep a copy of the database at a completely different location or an alternate location where it remains safe in the event of a worst-case failure or a crash of the original database.

Sharing data is one of the main advantages of a database management system. With a DBMS, users with access control can share desired data between other applications and users. DBMS is centralized and usually stores data with multiple levels of access authorization across one or more servers on the network. Data can be shared only if it meets certain authorization protocols specified by the administrator.

DBMS also allows users to access data remotely and also gives the ability to share the data among others. 

Data integrity refers to the accuracy and consistency of the data in the database. Data integrity is an important factor in DBMS as there can be multiple databases with data accessible for multiple users. The DBMS ensures that the data remains accurate and consistent across all databases for all users accessing data from the database. DBMS uses multiple integrity constraints to maintain data integrity.

With more users accessing data and sharing it among others, there is a greater risk of data security. Organizations primarily invest time, effort, and money to ensure that their data remains secure in any scenario. DBMS helps them to accomplish data security as it provides a framework to ensure data security along with following strong security policies.

Since data security is a major concern, DBMS allows only authorized users to access the database. To authenticate identity or grant access privileges, the DBMS uses various mechanisms, such as usernames and passwords. It restricts unauthorized users to access the database and keeps the data secure under any circumstances. 

Even though only authorized users can access the database using the DBMS, it also ensures that each user only accesses the data according to the specified privacy constraints. A DBMS has multiple levels of database access, allowing users to access only data that is allowed for a particular user. Not every user can access all the data in the database by using limited access privileges.

For example, in social media sites, users have access to their specific accounts and information because the access constraints differ from one account to another. When shared publicly, the information becomes visible to all users. Thus, data privacy is feasible with the DBMS.

Since a DBMS stores data in one or more servers on the network, multiple users can access and modify the data in the database. DBMS uses different software locking mechanisms to restrict multiple users to modify the same set of data at the same time. This allows balanced data concurrency, allowing one user to make changes at a time.

Data redundancy appears when the same data is stored unnecessarily multiple times in different locations. Data redundancy is quite common in traditional file-based systems. With file-based systems, data is usually stored multiple times in different locations in a system or sometimes even across multiple systems. However, it has been minimized or almost removed in DBMS.

With a DBMS, all data is stored in a single database in one centralized location, even though the data is managed by multiple users and for multiple applications. Any changes made to the data are reflected immediately in the same data or file in the same database. Because of this, there are no duplicates of data or any possibility of encountering duplicate data.

In the traditional file system, changes made by one user to one application do not get updated in another application, even though both have the same set of details. In this way, the data may vary from user to user depending on the application.

For example, suppose we have the address of a person in multiple tables. When we change it in only one table, it is not updated in other tables, causing a data inconsistency problem.

Data redundancy leads to data inconsistency. Since there is no data redundancy in DBMS, data consistency is minimized or almost removed with DBMS. DBMS uses a single repository of data, which is defined only once and is accessed by multiple users, thereby ensuring data consistency.

Although setting up an entire DBMS environment can be somewhat costly at times, its maintenance cost is comparatively very less. Maintenance includes all such routine work that is done with the intention of improving the database and its functioning. This usually includes performance checks, checking for data errors, finding hardware faults, freeing up disk space, installing updates, etc. 

Multi-access or multi-user support is a huge advantage of using a DBMS. It allows multiple users from different locations to access a particular data from the database simultaneously. With multi-access support, information is available to each authorized person across the organization in different departments.

The availability of data in the database, with the support of multiple specialized tools, helps in extracting useful information whenever the users require it. It somehow enables the end-users to make quick, informative, and better decisions, which can make a significant difference between the success and failure of any organization.

This article discusses more than 15 advantages of DBMS (Database Management System). Due to the significant advantages, DBMS has become one of the main needs of many organizations these days to perform data management-based tasks.