Eskildsen: Elasticsearch Was the Most Difficult and Aggravating Database at Shopify
Simon Eskildsen · Retrieval After RAG: Hybrid Search, Agents, and Database Design — Simon Eskildsen of Turbopuffer · Mar 12, 2026 · at 7:51
Simon Eskildsen, founder of Turbopuffer, reflects on his decade managing databases and infrastructure at Shopify.
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“The database that was the most difficult for me to scale during that time, and that was the most aggravating to be on call for, was Elasticsearch. It was very, very difficult to deal with, and I saw a lot of projects that were just being held back in their ambition by using it.”
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