TPCx-V Details
TPCx-V is a Virtual Machine benchmark for database workloads.
The current TPCx-V specification can be found on the TPC Documentation Webpage.

TPC Express Benchmark(tm) V (TPCx-V) Overview

The TPCx-V benchmark measures the performance of a server running virtualized databases. It is similar to previous virtualization benchmarks in that it has many VMs running different workloads. It is also similar to previous TPC benchmarks in that it uses the schema and transactions of the TPC-E benchmark. But TPCx-V is unique since unlike previous virtualization benchmarks, it has a database-centric workload, and models many properties of cloud servers, such as multiple VMs running at different load demand levels, and large fluctuations in the load level of each VM. Unlike previous TPC benchmarks, TPCx-V will have a publicly-available, end-to-end benchmarking kit.

TPCx-V Properties

  • Simulate cloud computing with:
    • A mix of On Line Transaction Processing (OLTP) and Decision Support Systems (DSS) workloads
    • Use databases of different sizes and load levels
  • Vary load levels to each VM to represent the elastic nature of load levels on cloud computing servers
  • Devise a workload that stresses the virtualization layer and drives the state of the art for future hypervisor designs
  • A Tiled architecture that requires more Tiles on larger servers
  • But unlike earlier virtualization benchmarks, the load of TPCx-V Tiles is not constant: as in real world, larger servers run larger VMs, not just more VMs
  • Improved ease of benchmarking compared to TPC-E. For example, the TPC-E schema makes it impossible to initially populate the database for one performance level, but run against a subset of the loaded data. TPCx-V schema has been updated to allow a benchmark sponsor to initially populate L1 Load Units , but run against L2 Load Unit, L2 < L1.
  • Currently, the TPCx-V kit is written to run on PostgreSQL. Future kit revisions may add the ability to use other databases


For a more complete discussion of the architecture and properties of TPCx-V, see the following two papers presented at TPCTC 2013 and TPCTC 2015: A key property of TPCx-V is that it is a TPC Express benchmark. As such, it comes with a complete, end-to-end kit that:
  • creates the schema
  • populates flat files and loads them into the database
  • runs the benchmark, and post-processes the logs to generate performance metrics
  • runs a battery of validation tests to verify that the numerical test results (response times, transaction mix, Tile and Group ratios, transaction input parameters, etc.) are valid
  • runs a series of self-audit applications to verify that the results conform to the TPCx-V specification requirement
  • generates the Executive Summary for the run
The complete TPCx-V benchmark consists of:
  • the TPCx-V specification
  • the benchmark kit
  • a User's Guide
We have also made available two other files to help potential benchmarkers get a quick start with TPCx-V:
  • an ovf-format VM template to give the user a complete, pre-configured benchmarking environment
  • a PowerCLI script to clone VMs in the VMware vSphere environment

To download the latest TPCx-V Spec - click here
To download the latest TPCx-V User's Guide - click here
To download the benchmark kit or the ovf-format VM template - click here