| Snowflake Schema | Star Schema | |
---|---|---|---|
DimTable Normalization: | 3 Normal Form | 2 Normal Denormalized Form |
|
Joins: | Higher number of Joins | Fewer Joins |
|
Ease of Use: | More complex queries and hence less easy to understand | Less complex queries and easy to understand | |
Query Performance: | More foreign keys-and hence more query execution time | Less no. of foreign keys and hence lesser query execution time | |
Ease of maintenance/change: | No redundancy and hence more easy to maintain and change | Has redundant data and hence less easy to maintain/change |
|
Type of Datawarehouse: | Good to use for small datawarehouses/datamarts | Good for large datawarehouses | |
Dimension table: | It may have more than one dimension table for each dimension | Contains only single dimension table for each dimension |
from http://www.diffen.com/difference/Snowflake_Schema_vs_Star_Schema