What Flyway does

Flyway is an open-source database migration and version control tool founded in 2010 and operated by Red Gate Software Ltd, a private UK limited company headquartered in Cambridge. The product enables developers, database administrators, and DevOps engineers to manage database schema changes across development, testing, and production environments using plain SQL scripts, with no proprietary format or vendor lock-in. Underlying technology is Java-based (requiring Java 7+ and a JDBC driver) and exposes the same migration engine via command line, Java API, Maven, and Gradle integration.

The core product supports more than 50 database platforms including Microsoft SQL Server, PostgreSQL, Oracle, MySQL, Snowflake, MongoDB, Databricks, CockroachDB, ClickHouse, IBM DB2, Google BigQuery, SQLite, Cassandra, and MariaDB, as well as cloud-managed services (Amazon RDS, Microsoft Azure SQL, Google Cloud SQL, Heroku). Differentiating technical features include filesystem and classpath scanning under a convention-over-configuration model, a fail-fast mechanism that prevents application startup on inconsistent or failed migrations, auto-migration on application startup via the Java API, cluster-safe parallel migration execution, multi-language migration scripts (Java, Python, Shell, PowerShell), and native SQL Fluff integration for linting.

The business model is a freemium-to-enterprise pattern. The Community edition is free, open-source, and serves as the primary acquisition channel through direct website download and self-service build-tool integration. The Enterprise edition is sold via Redgate's direct sales team on annual subscriptions with non-public pricing, adding advanced automation, governance controls, collaborative tooling, regular updates, proactive fixes, and dedicated support. Distribution is product-led and community-led: top-of-funnel growth flows through the flyway/flyway GitHub repository (120+ contributors), Stack Overflow, Redgate's learning and community hub, Simple Talk, and industry events like PASS Data Community Summit. Named users include the Pivotal/Spring Boot team, ThoughtWorks, and Red Hat. Flyway is one of more than 30 products in the broader Redgate portfolio, which includes SQL Compare, SQL Prompt, Redgate Monitor, Test Data Manager, and .NET tooling.

Name

Flyway

Legal name

Red Gate Software Ltd

Website

https://flywaydb.org

Company type

Private

Founded year

2010

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

Flyway is an open-source database migration tool owned by Red Gate Software Ltd that uses plain SQL scripts to version-control and deploy schema changes across 50+ database platforms. It serves developers, DBAs, and DevOps teams via a free Community edition and a paid Enterprise subscription tier.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Headquarters

HQ city

Cambridge

HQ country

United Kingdom

HQ region

Europe

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Software

Cost components

Technology or R&D, Personnel, Marketing or Sales, Operations

Revenue model

1. Community Edition (Freemium): Free Community edition provides core database migration functionality for individuals and education. Serves as the primary acquisition channel for the paid Enterprise edition.
2. Enterprise Edition (Subscription): Paid Enterprise edition with advanced features for complex environments and pipelines, greater stability and security with regular updates, collaborative tools for team-based development and governance, and dedicated support.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels8 records

Core offering

Flyway is an open-source database migration and versioning tool that uses plain SQL scripts to manage, version-control, and deploy database schema changes. It is available as a free Community edition (CLI, Java API, Maven, Gradle, Desktop GUI) and a paid Enterprise edition with advanced features for complex pipelines, governance, and dedicated support, supporting 50+ database platforms including SQL Server, PostgreSQL, Oracle, MySQL, Snowflake, MongoDB, and Databricks.

Product overview

Redgate offers a comprehensive database and .NET development tools portfolio. The core offering centers on Redgate Flyway, an industry-standard database migration and versioning tool (since 2010) available in free Community and paid Enterprise editions, supporting 50+ database platforms. The SQL Server tool suite includes SQL Compare, SQL Data Compare, SQL Source Control, SQL Clone, SQL Backup, SQL Doc, SQL Prompt, and others for comparison, deployment, version control, provisioning, documentation, and productivity. Oracle and PostgreSQL have dedicated comparison tools (Schema Compare for Oracle, Data Compare for Oracle, Redgate pgCompare, Schema Compare for MySQL). The .NET toolkit features ANTS Performance Profiler, ANTS Memory Profiler, .NET Reflector, and SmartAssembly for profiling, decompilation, and obfuscation. Database monitoring is covered by Redgate Monitor, and test data management by Redgate Test Data Manager. These products are sold individually and in bundles like SQL Toolbelt Essentials and .NET Developer Bundle, positioned across the database development lifecycle from design through deployment and monitoring.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Redgate Flyway Community: Free database migration tool offering API/CLI and Desktop GUI for individuals and education, built on open source.
• Redgate Flyway Enterprise

Products and services

• Redgate Flyway Community Free database migration tool offering API, CLI, and Desktop GUI for version-controlling and deploying database migrations using plain SQL scripts. Built for individuals, educators, and small teams, supporting 50+ database platforms.
• Redgate Flyway Enterprise Enterprise-grade database migration solution with advanced automation features for complex environments and pipelines, governance controls, collaborative tools for team-based development, regular stability and security updates, and dedicated support.

Quantifiable outcome

• Get up and running in 5 minutes
• +1 more outcomes

Named customers4 records

Segments4 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

Yes

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Integration1 record

Feature9 records

Partnerships

One partnership is on record.

• GitHub CommunitycoreOthersOpen-source Flyway project hosted on GitHub with 120+ contributors. Community members contribute through issue reporting, bug fixes, feature requests, and pull requests. Active maintenance and collaboration on the public repository.

Scale indicators4 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Liquibase: Liquibase is the closest direct competitor to Flyway in the database schema version control and migration space, supporting a similar range of databases and offering both open-source and enterprise editions targeting DevOps teams.
• Bytebase: Bytebase provides database DevOps and schema change tooling with both open-source and team/enterprise plans, competing head-on with Flyway Enterprise in CI/CD-integrated database change management.
• DBMaestro: DBMaestro is an enterprise-focused database DevOps and release automation platform overlapping with Flyway Enterprise on policy enforcement, change auditing, and CI/CD integration for regulated enterprises.

Emerging players

• Atlas (Ariga): Atlas is an emerging schema-as-code migration tool from Ariga targeting modern DevOps workflows, overlapping with Flyway on declarative schema versioning while emphasizing Terraform-like authoring.
• Alembic (SQLAlchemy): Alembic is the de facto open-source migration tool in the Python/SQLAlchemy ecosystem; it overlaps with Flyway for Python-heavy teams but is narrower in database and language support.
• dbmate: dbmate is a lightweight, Go-based open-source database migration tool appealing to developers seeking a simpler alternative to Flyway, with a smaller community but overlapping core use case.
• Skeema: Skeema is an open-source schema management tool for MySQL/MariaDB with declarative migrations, competing for the same DevOps-friendly migration mindset but with a narrower database footprint than Flyway.
• Sqitch: Sqitch is an open-source, script-based database change management tool emphasizing dependency-aware migrations; it overlaps with Flyway in plain-SQL migrations but has a much smaller community footprint.

Broad incumbents

• Red Gate Software: Red Gate Software is Flyway's parent company and a broad incumbent in SQL Server tooling (SQL Compare, SQL Source Control, SQL Clone, SQL Prompt, SQL Doc, etc.), providing the integration ecosystem and enterprise sales motion that flyway Enterprise depends on.

Others

• Harness: Harness is a broader CI/CD and DevOps platform that can absorb or replace Flyway for organizations consolidating onto a single vendor; adjacent rather than direct, but a potential channel conflict as DevOps suites grow.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/flywaydb
• GitHubgithub.com/flyway/flyway
• YouTubeyoutube.com/user/RedGateVideos
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/red-gate-software

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Flyway