SQLite lasts until writes or deployment outgrow it

SQLite can serve a web application for its whole life when the database stays on one host and writes are short enough to take turns. A database service becomes useful when contention hurts response times, several hosts need shared access, or recovery needs exceed the arrangement you can operate.

Visitor counts conceal the real workload: SQLite's documentation describes its own website handling 400,000–500,000 daily HTTP requests on one virtual machine in 2015, with only 15–20% touching the database. That historical example cannot set your capacity limit because cached page views differ from expensive queries and transactions updating several tables. Even 100,000 daily requests averages only a calculated 1.16 per second, while a burst can place a much heavier demand on the same database.

Write duration matters because SQLite permits one simultaneous write transaction per database, though multiple connections can read. In a simplified calculation, two-millisecond transactions fit at most 500 times into a second, while twenty-millisecond transactions fit only 50; these are arithmetic ceilings under assumed holding times, not benchmarks. Keeping a transaction open during a slow network call therefore makes other writers wait for work the database itself is not doing.

Write-ahead logging, or WAL, lets readers and a writer proceed concurrently but retains that single-writer limit. Before migrating for speed, inspect query plans, transaction duration, lock waits, and peak response times using realistic data and durability settings. A longer timeout may absorb a brief clash, but it creates no extra write capacity and can turn visible errors into requests that wait too long.

Deployment and recovery can justify a service before traffic does: ordinary WAL requires participating processes on the same host, and SQLite warns about locking and synchronization risks on network filesystems. A separate service keeps the engine beside storage and sends requests over the network, while backups still need a consistent snapshot and a tested restore process. Copying only the main database during WAL activity can miss committed data in its log, so include the complete recovery procedure when comparing operating costs.

Migrate when a tested replacement solves a constraint you can name, while meeting your targets for peak latency, acceptable data loss, and restoration time.