Drizzle vs Neon for Solo Developers

Quick Comparison

Drizzle Overview

Drizzle ORM is a lightweight, type-safe TypeScript ORM that keeps you close to SQL. Your queries map directly to the SQL they produce. You define schemas in TypeScript, run migrations with drizzle-kit, and get full type inference without a code generation step. The client is small, loads fast in serverless environments, and works across Postgres, MySQL, and SQLite.

Solo developers like Drizzle because it is transparent. There is no "what query did it actually run?" debugging. You see the SQL, you understand the SQL, and you control the SQL. When you need a complex join or a CTE, you write it in Drizzle syntax and it works exactly as expected.

The trade-off is that Drizzle is only an ORM. You need a database to connect it to, and choosing that database is a separate decision entirely.

Neon Overview

Neon is a serverless Postgres platform that separates compute from storage. Your database scales to zero when nobody is using it and spins up in milliseconds when a request comes in. You only pay for what you use. The free tier includes 0.5 GB of storage and 190 compute hours per month, which is plenty for solo projects.

What makes Neon different from other Postgres hosts is branching. You can create instant branches of your database, just like git branches for your data. This is great for testing schema changes, running CI against a copy of production data, or giving preview deployments their own database. Each branch is a copy-on-write clone, so it does not duplicate your storage.

Neon uses standard Postgres, so every tool, library, and ORM that works with Postgres works with Neon. Including Drizzle.

Head-to-Head Comparison

When to Pick Drizzle

Pick Drizzle when you need a typed query layer on top of whatever Postgres database you are already using. That database might be Neon, Supabase, Railway, or a self-hosted instance. Drizzle does not care where your Postgres lives.

It is also the right choice when you are comparing ORMs. If the decision is Drizzle versus Prisma versus TypeORM versus raw SQL, that is a separate question from where to host your database. Drizzle wins when you want SQL-like syntax, small bundle size, and zero runtime dependencies.

You might also pick Drizzle if you need multi-database support. If your project uses both Postgres and SQLite (maybe SQLite for local dev and Postgres for production), Drizzle supports both with the same API patterns.

When to Pick Neon

Pick Neon when you need a Postgres database and you want a modern, serverless-friendly host. The free tier is one of the best available for solo developers. Scale-to-zero means you do not pay for a database that sits idle while you are sleeping or working your day job.

Neon is the right choice when you deploy to Vercel, Cloudflare Workers, or other serverless platforms. The built-in connection pooler handles the challenge of many short-lived connections that serverless functions create.

Choose Neon if database branching appeals to you. Being able to spin up a copy of your production database for testing, then throw it away, is a workflow that saves time and prevents accidents.

The Verdict

This is not really an either-or decision. Drizzle is an ORM. Neon is a database host. They work together naturally, and the combination is one of the best setups available for solo developers working in TypeScript.

Drizzle plus Neon gives you type-safe queries, a serverless Postgres database with a generous free tier, database branching for safe schema changes, and minimal operational overhead. The total cost for a solo project can be literally zero.

If you are starting a new TypeScript project and you need a database, use both. Set up a Neon database, connect Drizzle to it, and start building. You get the best ORM and one of the best Postgres hosts available today, and you pay nothing until your project actually needs to scale.