Horizontal sharding for MySQL made easy

This post explains the concept of horizontal sharding for MySQL databases as a solution to scale limitations beyond monolithic databases. It contrasts vertical and horizontal scaling, discusses the cost of overprovisioning, and highlights the challenges of implementing sharding at the application layer, citing examples from Pinterest and Etsy. The post then introduces Vitess as an open-source solution that handles sharding logic externally, providing operational benefits. Finally, it positions PlanetScale as a managed platform that democratizes Vitess's capabilities, offering horizontal sharding, online schema migrations, and other features with reduced complexity and risk.