Top all-time · #1079
Expensify
Company blog · blog.expensify.combusinessstartups
Expensify is the company blog at blog.expensify.com, writing about business and startups. Since 2009, 64 different Hacker News readers have linked it 105 times, most often “Scaling SQLite to 4M QPS on a Single Server (EC2 vs. Bare Metal)”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-29, and you can follow it by feed.
Rarely recommended · 1 of 40 sampled comments recommend it?
Why HN links it
HN readers mostly link Expensify's blog for its 2018 post on scaling SQLite to 4M queries per second; most other links are job ads or one 2011 hiring post.
- Recommended for · 1 comments
- Said to show SQLite scales amazingly well, and recommended as a read on how Expensify uses it.1
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 40 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Take a deep dive into what Expensify does best, with insightful articles and tips on expense management, spend optimization, and more.
Most-linked posts?
- Scaling SQLite to 4M QPS on a Single Server (EC2 vs. Bare Metal)26 people · 33 mentions · first linked 2018-01-10
- Why we don’t hire .NET programmers (2011 but timeless)8 people · 8 mentions · first linked 2016-03-21
- CEO Friday: Why we don’t hire .NET programmers6 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2011-03-25
- How to take your whole company overseas, and live to tell the tale3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2013-10-25
- Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2014-01-24
- /2016/06/17/expensifys-comp-review-process/2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2016-07-14
- /2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-qps-on-a-single-server/amp/2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2018-02-12
What Hacker News says?
>Is the anti windows/.NET bias really that common? ... I feel like .NET devs are looked down upon I don't have evidence of a wide random sampling of "trendy" employers but based on anecdotes[1][2], I think it is. Many trendy companies (a.k.a. "hot startups") overwhelmingly favor a Linux + open source stack. If the hiring managers at these companies see a resume with just ".NET/Winforms/WPF/ASP.NET", they perceive a…
Comment linking /2011/03/25/ceo-friday-why-we-dont-hire-net-programmers/
on “We only hire the trendiest”Submitted Scaling SQLite to 4M QPS on a Single Server (EC2 vs. Bare Metal) as a story · 133 points
HN discussionExpensify | Full-Stack, PHP, Java, C++, iOS, Android, and/or Infrastructure Engineer | San Francisco, Portland, Michigan, London | REMOTE, VISA welcome | Full-time | we.are.expensify.com | $135K+ Expensify is the most widely used expense management system in the world, with millions of users and more customers than the rest of the industry combined, processing billions of real dollars annually. Expensify has ~130 em…
Comment linking /2016/06/03/rule-1-get-shit-done/
on “Ask HN: Who is hiring right now?”Submitted CEO Friday: Why we don’t hire .NET programmers as a story · 98 points
HN discussionSqlite can handle that https://blog.expensify.com/2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-q... I've been toying around with it locally for playing with big data sets (50-100s GB) uncompressed and it works pretty well. It's much easier than postgres and mysql which have a lot more knobs and tuning required)
Comment linking /2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-qps-on-a-single-server/
on “SQLite is not a toy database”Submitted Bringing Silicon Valley to the Midwest as a story · 89 points
HN discussionsqlite can actually be scaled quite high: 4mio qps (queries per second) https://blog.expensify.com/2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-q...
Comment linking /2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-qps-on-a-single-server/
on “SQLite is not a toy database”Submitted Scaling SQLite to 4M QPS on a Single Server (EC2 vs. Bare Metal) as a story · 69 points
HN discussionDepending on the use case (SaaS offerings with per customer shards) you can actually scale sqlite quite high. Expensify scaled to 4 mio qps (queries per second) [1], so if one of your customers is exceeding that, you better be looking at another DBMS but below that - well sqlite is an option. [1] https://blog.expensify.com/2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-q...
Comment linking /2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-qps-on-a-single-server/
on “SQLite is not a toy database”Submitted Expensify's firing strategy as a story · 59 points
HN discussionSurprised no one has mentioned how Expensify use SQLite as their main data store: https://blog.expensify.com/2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-q...
Comment linking /2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-qps-on-a-single-server/
on “SQLite is not a toy database”Submitted Scaling SQLite to 4M QPS on a Single Server as a story · 38 points
HN discussionCuriously, I just read this: https://blog.expensify.com/2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-q...
Comment linking /2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-qps-on-a-single-server/
on “Jepsen Disputes MongoDB's Data Consistency Claims”Submitted Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup as a story · 38 points
HN discussionhttps://blog.expensify.com/2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-q...
Comment linking /2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-qps-on-a-single-server/
on “Why I Built Litestream”Submitted Is the TechCrunch50 DemoPit worth it? as a story · 17 points
HN discussionA better comparison might be Postgres to BedrockDB. BeckrockDB is a MySQL compatible interface wrapped around SQLite and as such, is intended for remote RDBMS use. Expensify has some interesting scaling performance data for their use of it. https://blog.expensify.com/2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-q...
Comment linking /2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-qps-on-a-single-server/
on “LiteFS”Submitted Why we don’t hire .NET programmers (2011 but timeless) as a story · 6 points
HN discussionIn this case it seems to mean building an extra server layer on-top of it. - https://blog.expensify.com/2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-q... - https://bedrockdb.com/
Comment linking /2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-qps-on-a-single-server/
on “Cold Showers: For when people get too hyped up about things”Submitted Cross platform mobile development, Oh My! as a story · 5 points
HN discussionExpensify | Full-Stack, PHP, Java, C++, iOS, Android, and/or Infrastructure Engineer | San Francisco, Portland, Michigan, London | REMOTE, VISA welcome | Full-time | we.are.expensify.com | $135K+ Expensify is the most widely used expense management system in the world, with millions of users and more customers than the rest of the industry combined, processing billions of real dollars annually. Expensify has ~130 em…
Comment linking /2016/06/03/rule-1-get-shit-done/
on “Ask HN: Who is hiring? (January 2019)”Submitted Expensify and the surprisingly difficult challenge of finding the right people as a story · 5 points
HN discussion50k reads per second? And you need how many servers for that? Sqlite can't do infinite reads but pretty close https://blog.expensify.com/2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-q...
Comment linking /2018/01/08/scaling-sqlite-to-4m-qps-on-a-single-server/
on “SQLite the only database you will ever need in most cases”Submitted We don’t hire .NET programmers (2011) as a story · 4 points
HN discussionExpensify | Full-Stack, PHP, Java, C++, iOS, Android, and/or Infrastructure Engineer | San Francisco, Portland, Michigan, London | REMOTE, VISA welcome | Full-time | we.are.expensify.com | $135K+ Expensify is the most widely used expense management system in the world, with millions of users and more customers than the rest of the industry combined, processing billions of real dollars annually. Expensify has ~130 em…
Comment linking /2016/06/03/rule-1-get-shit-done/
on “Ask HN: Who is hiring? (October 2018)”Submitted Scaling SQLite to 4M QPS on a Single Server (EC2 vs. Bare Metal) as a story · 4 points
HN discussionExpensify | Full-Stack, PHP, Java, C++, iOS, Android, and/or Infrastructure Engineer | San Francisco, Portland, Michigan, London | REMOTE, VISA welcome | Full-time | we.are.expensify.com | $135K+ Expensify is the most widely used expense management system in the world, with millions of users and more customers than the rest of the industry combined, processing billions of real dollars annually. Expensify has ~130 em…
Comment linking /2016/06/03/rule-1-get-shit-done/
on “Ask HN: Who is hiring? (November 2018)”Submitted Why we don’t hire .NET programmers as a story · 4 points
HN discussionReminds me of this steaming pile from last year http://blog.expensify.com/2011/03/25/ceo-friday-why-we-dont-...
Comment linking /2011/03/25/ceo-friday-why-we-dont-hire-net-programmers/
on “I don't hire unlucky people”Submitted Adverecruiting: Our Latest Bart/Muni Ads as a story · 4 points
HN discussion
