What is IBM Cloudant?
IBM Cloudant® is a distributed database that is optimized for handling heavy workloads that are typical of large, fast-growing web and mobile apps. Available as an SLA-backed, fully managed IBM Cloud™ service, Cloudant elastically scales throughput and storage independently. Cloudant is also available as a downloadable on-premises installation. The API and powerful replication protocol are compatible with an open source ecosystem that includes Apache CouchDB, PouchDB and libraries for the most popular web and mobile development stacks. → Get the Kubernetes Operator for Apache CouchDB (link resides outside IBM)
Cloudant features
Serverless
Our IBM Cloud service provides a fully managed, distributed database. Instantly deploy an instance, create databases and independently scale throughput capacity and data storage to meet your application requirements. Our expertise takes away the pain of hardware and software provisioning, patching and upgrades, while offering a 99.99 percent SLA.
Secure
Cloudant is ISO27001, SOC 2 Type 2 compliant and HIPAA ready. All data is encrypted over the wire and at rest, with optional user-defined encryption key management through IBM Key Protect. The service integrates with IBM Identity and Access Management (IAM) for granular access control at the API level.
Global availability
Distribute data across zones, regions and cloud providers to build highly resilient applications. Cloudant is available in all IBM Cloud regions and 55+ data centers across the world. Distribute data across continents for global application performance and disaster recovery requirements. All Cloudant instances are deployed on clusters that span availability zones in regions that support them for added durability at no extra cost.
Zero Vendor Lock In
Cloudant is API compatible with Apache CouchDB, enabling you to access an abundance of language libraries and tools to rapidly build new applications and features with peace of mind. Deploy your database in the cloud of your choosing.
Durable replication
Move application data closer to all the places it needs to be — for uninterrupted data access, offline or online. Cloudant helps teams build Progressive Web Apps, develop with an offline-first architecture, or manipulate data on edge devices.
Powerful API
Enhance your applications with built-in key-value, MapReduce, full-text search and geospatial querying that go beyond simple bounding boxes. Stream the changes feed for seamless integration with event-driven applications and IBM Cloud Functions.
How it’s used
Serverless web app and API
In this tutorial, you’ll create a serverless web application by hosting static website content on GitHub Pages and implementing the application back end, using IBM Cloud Functions.

Mobile app with serverless
In this tutorial, you'll learn how to use IBM Cloud Functions along with cognitive and data services to build a serverless back end for a mobile app.

Find anomalies in IoT data
This tutorial shows how to set up an IoT device and gather data in the IBM Watson IoT® Platform. Create visualizations and use advanced ML services to analyze historical data and detect anomalies.

Open hybrid multicloud
This tutorial shows how to pair the API and powerful replication protocol of Cloudant with Apache CouchDB in a hybrid cloud environment.

Cloudant benefits
TrustRadius Widget
Explore the technology

A guide to Apache CouchDB
Explore the features, benefits, and ease of use CouchDB brings to enterprise database management.

A guide to NoSQL databases
Everything you need to know about NoSQL, a type of database design that offers more flexibility than traditional databases.

Cloud databases from IBM
A rich portfolio of SQL and NoSQL databases designed for transactional workloads, web and mobile apps, and blazing fast analytics.