Despite the NoSQL nature of the underlying data store, Salesforce has leveraged its investment in creating the Apache Phoenix technology and made it possible to deliver the ability to use a subset of the well-known SOQL syntax to query big objects. In this section, we will review some key differences with regular standard and custom big objects.

There are also two ways in which you can perform SOQL queries: synchronously and asynchronously. The available SOQL feature set varies depending on which path you take. Developers can leverage the Salesforce REST API or Apex SOQL APIs to perform synchronous queries, while only the Salesforce REST API has support for running asynchronous queries.