head to head · open source
airflow vs debezium
airflow has 47,147 GitHub stars, 18,000 forks, 1,831 open issues and last shipped yesterday. debezium has 13,210 stars, 3,080 forks, 131 open issues and last shipped yesterday. airflow leads on adoption by 257% (47,147 vs 13,210 stars). airflow is written in Python under Apache-2.0; debezium is written in Java under Apache-2.0. airflow has attracted 38% as many forks as stars, debezium 23%. debezium was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| airflow | debezium | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 47K | ★ 13K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Python | Java |
| Last push | 2026-10-11 | 2026-10-11 |
| Forks | ⑂ 18K | ⑂ 3.1K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick airflow if
- You weight community size — 47K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick debezium if
- You want the debezium feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You evaluated both and debezium fits your workflow better
About airflow
Apache Airflow is an open source Python platform for programmatically authoring, scheduling, and monitoring data workflows, aimed at data engineers, data scientists, and MLOps teams who need to orchestrate pipelines as code.
read the full airflow overview →
About debezium
Debezium is an open source, low latency change data capture (CDC) platform that monitors databases and turns every row level change into an ordered event stream that applications consume, and it is built for Java teams already running Apache Kafka and Kafka Connect.
read the full debezium overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is airflow or debezium more popular?
airflow has 47,147 GitHub stars and debezium has 13,210. airflow has the larger community by that measure.
Are airflow and debezium free?
Both are open source. airflow is licensed under Apache-2.0 and debezium under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between airflow and debezium?
airflow is written in Python and debezium in Java. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, airflow or debezium?
Choose airflow if you want the larger community (47,147 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose debezium if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.