Database Migration Strategies for Banks: Zero-Downtime Schema Changes at Scale
Migrating a banking database is one of the highest-risk operations in financial technology. A failed migration can lock customers out of their accounts, corrupt transaction data, or trigger regulatory violations. The database is the system of record — everything else is derived from it. We have migrated banking databases with over 100 million rows and 99.99% uptime requirements. The key is not the migration tool — it is the migration strategy. Every schema change must be backward-compatible, reversible, and testable in production without impacting customers. ...