What Is Firebase?
Firebase is Google's Backend-as-a-Service platform — providing a real-time NoSQL database (Firestore), authentication, cloud storage, hosting, and serverless functions from one platform.
Firebase gives you a hosted backend without managing servers. It's particularly strong for mobile apps and real-time experiences.
Core products:
- Firestore — real-time NoSQL document database
- Firebase Auth — email/password, OAuth, phone authentication
- Cloud Functions — Node.js serverless functions triggered by events
- Firebase Storage — file uploads and media hosting
- Firebase Hosting — static and dynamic web hosting
Firebase vs Supabase: Firebase uses NoSQL (documents). Supabase uses Postgres (SQL). For mobile-first apps with simple data models: Firebase. For multi-tenant SaaS with relational data and compliance needs: Supabase.
Firebase pricing: Spark plan (free) is generous for MVPs. Blaze plan (pay-as-you-go) scales with usage — Firestore reads, writes, and network egress are billed per operation. Set budget alerts before going to production.
Security rules: Firestore security rules are the equivalent of RLS — they control who can read and write which documents. Write them before going to production. A misconfigured rule can expose all user data.
// Allow users to read only their own documents
match /users/{userId} {
allow read, write: if request.auth.uid == userId;
}