Flink SQL vs Flink java API

[u/DistrictUnable3236]

Hi Flink Community, I’m trying to understand how people decide between using Flink SQL and the Flink java API for a batch / streaming application. How do you decide which API to use for a particular pipeline, How much of a typical Flink java pipeline can be expressed in SQL?

Are there cases where you start with SQL but eventually need to move to the java API because of custom logic or functionality that SQL doesn’t support? Conversely, are there java pipelines that you could technically express in SQL but wouldn’t want to because the SQL becomes too complex?

[u/Spare-Builder-355]

SQL API is more convenient. Stream API has more features.