MyISAM and InnoDB are two most commonly used storage engines of MySQL database. However, MyISAM is the default storage engine chosen by MySQL database, when creating a new table. The major differences between these two storage engines are :
InnoDB supports transactions which is not supported by tables which use MyISAM storage engine.
InnoDB has row-level locking, relational integrity i.e. supports foreign keys, which is not possible in MyISAM.
InnoDB ‘s performance for high volume data cannot be beaten by any other storage engines available.
Tables created in MyISAM are known to have higher speed compared to tables in InnoDB. But since InnoDB supports volume, transactions, integrity it’s always a better option which you are dealing with a larger database. It is worth mentioning that a single database can have tables of different storage engines.
File structure
MyISAM stores each table on disk with three files whose names begin with same as table name. These files have different extensions to differentiate their purpose. A .frm files stores the table format, and a .MYD (MYData) file stores the data of the table. If the table has indexes then these are stored in the .MYI (MYIndex) files.
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InnoDB supports transactions which is not supported by tables which use MyISAM storage engine.
InnoDB has row-level locking, relational integrity i.e. supports foreign keys, which is not possible in MyISAM.
InnoDB ‘s performance for high volume data cannot be beaten by any other storage engines available.
Tables created in MyISAM are known to have higher speed compared to tables in InnoDB. But since InnoDB supports volume, transactions, integrity it’s always a better option which you are dealing with a larger database. It is worth mentioning that a single database can have tables of different storage engines.
File structure
MyISAM stores each table on disk with three files whose names begin with same as table name. These files have different extensions to differentiate their purpose. A .frm files stores the table format, and a .MYD (MYData) file stores the data of the table. If the table has indexes then these are stored in the .MYI (MYIndex) files.
Read more: digimantra