---
title: Frequently asked questions
description: Frequently asked questions about time series data, what InfluxDB is used for, which industries use it, and which version of InfluxDB to choose.
url: https://docs.influxdata.com/platform/faq/
estimated_tokens: 807
publisher: InfluxData
canonical: https://docs.influxdata.com/platform/faq/
date: '2026-06-05T09:44:20-05:00'
lastmod: '2026-06-05T09:44:20-05:00'
---

## What is time series data?

Time series data is a sequence of data points, each associated with a
timestamp, that measure how something changes over time. Common examples
include server and application metrics, network telemetry, financial
prices, and sensor readings such as temperature, pressure, and voltage.
Time series workloads are write-heavy, append-mostly, and queried by time
range.

## What is InfluxDB used for?

InfluxDB is a purpose-built time series database for storing and querying
large volumes of timestamped data in real time. Common use cases include
infrastructure and application monitoring, network monitoring, IoT and
industrial sensor data, energy and battery (BESS) systems, and financial
market analytics. It is optimized for high-ingest workloads and fast
queries that power dashboards, alerting, and automation.

## What industries use InfluxDB?

InfluxDB is used across industrial IoT (IIoT) and manufacturing, energy
and battery energy storage systems (BESS), software observability and
DevOps monitoring, telecommunications and network operations, financial
services, and aerospace. These domains share a common need: ingest
high-frequency measurements from many sources and query them by time for
monitoring, analytics, and control.

## When should I use a time series database?

Use a time series database when your primary access pattern is “what
happened over this time range” and you ingest a continuous stream of
timestamped measurements. It is the right choice for metrics, events,
sensor data, and telemetry, where write throughput is high and queries
aggregate or downsample data by time. A general-purpose relational
database is a better fit for transactional, relationship-heavy data that
isn’t primarily organized by time.

## What's the difference between a time series database and a relational database?

A time series database is optimized for timestamped data: it ingests
millions of points per second, indexes by time, and runs time-windowed
aggregations efficiently. A relational database is optimized for
transactional integrity and relationships across normalized tables. You
can store time series in a relational database, but a single time-range
query can scan millions of rows. InfluxDB stores and queries data by time
out of the box, optionally downsamples data after a set age, and uses a
query engine tuned for time-based access.

## Is InfluxDB open source?

Yes. InfluxDB 3 Core is open source under the permissive MIT or Apache 2.0
license and is free to download and run with no license key. InfluxDB 3
Enterprise is a commercial product built on the same engine; it offers a
30-day free trial and a free at-home license for non-commercial use.
The earlier InfluxDB 1 and InfluxDB 2 open source releases remain
available under open source licenses. For new projects, use InfluxDB 3.

## Which version of InfluxDB should I use?

For new projects, use InfluxDB 3. For new production workloads, use
InfluxDB 3 Enterprise; use InfluxDB 3 Core for free, open source,
single-node deployments. See[Which InfluxDB 3 should I use?](/influxdb3/which-influxdb-3/) for a full
decision guide across InfluxDB 3 products and for migrating from
InfluxDB 1 or InfluxDB 2.