Which Index Type offers the highest compression?

The reason Columnstore indexes provide the highest compression is due to their innovative architecture designed specifically for analytical workloads. They store data in a columnar format rather than a traditional row-based format. This columnar storage allows for significant space savings, especially in scenarios where data in a column contains repetitive values. Since related data is stored together, the database engine can apply advanced compression algorithms on the columns, reducing the overall size of data significantly.

Additionally, Columnstore indexes support various compression techniques, including dictionary encoding and run-length encoding, which further enhance their ability to compress data compared to other index types. This makes them particularly beneficial for large datasets commonly used in data warehousing or big data analytics, where efficient storage and quick access times are critical.

Rowstore, on the other hand, maintains data in the order of rows. While they can provide some level of compression, it isn’t as effective as the methods employed by Columnstore. Heaps, which are essentially unordered tables without indexes, also do not support compression in the same way, and thus, cannot offer the same levels of space efficiency.

Therefore, in a scenario where maximum data compression is a priority, Columnstore indexes stand out as the superior option amongst the choices presented.