jdbc executeBatch vs. execute with big query

Question

I need to update / insert a large number of entries very fast. I see 2 options

• creating many queries and send them via executeBatch
• create one big query (contains all updates/inserts in db-specific syntax) and just execute it. Since the number of updates is fix ("batch size") i can prepare this statement too

The target db is oracle. The number of inserts/updates in a batch is a fixed number between 1000 and 10000 (does this number has some impact on performance?)

So what way to go?

Answer 1

Your options are essentially the same. In fact they may be identical, unless your second option is implemented in a poor way.

Using built in PreparedStatement batching is safer, since the driver will know what to do a lot better than you do. There's less chances for programmer error, and should it ever happen that you change your database provider, you won't need to double check whether your solution is still valid.

Make sure to check out how to properly perform the batching. For example the batch size is commonly 100 instead of the full amount of rows you wish to insert (so you would have 10 executeBatch() es to insert your 1000 rows).