Snowflake SnowPro Certification Practice Test

The main advantage of using Materialized views over Non-Materialized views is:

1. Lower storage costs

2. Increased performance due to stored results

3. Ability to edit data directly

4. Faster data retrieval without investing in storage

The correct answer is: Increased performance due to stored results

Materialized views provide a significant advantage in terms of performance because they store the results of a query physically on disk. This means that when the view is queried, the precomputed results can be accessed much more quickly than if the underlying data had to be computed in real-time every time the view was accessed. This characteristic is particularly beneficial for complex queries or large datasets that require substantial processing time. By using materialized views, the data is essentially cached, allowing for faster retrieval of the results without having to perform the entire computation again. This can lead to improved query response times and a more efficient use of resources. In scenarios where data does not change frequently or when near real-time performance is acceptable, materialized views can significantly enhance the performance of database operations. While non-materialized views allow for direct editing of underlying data and may involve lower storage costs, they do not offer the same performance benefits since they require computation each time the view is accessed. Thus, the primary advantage of materialized views lies in their ability to increase performance through the storage of precomputed query results.