head to head · open source
Ceph vs Alarik
Ceph has 17,050 GitHub stars, 6,504 forks, 1,353 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Alarik has 538 stars, 6 forks, 4 open issues and last shipped 15 days ago. Ceph leads on adoption by 3,069% (17,050 vs 538 stars). Ceph is written in C++ under a custom or non-standard licence; Alarik is written in Swift under Apache-2.0. Ceph has attracted 38% as many forks as stars, Alarik 1%. Ceph 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
| Ceph | Alarik | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 17K | ★ 538 |
| License | Custom / other | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | C++ | Swift |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-03 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.5K | ⑂ 6 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Ceph if
- You weight community size — 17K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Alarik if
- You want the Alarik feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Swift
- You evaluated both and Alarik fits your workflow better
About Ceph
Ceph is a scalable open source distributed storage system written in C++ and described as a platform for object, block, and file storage. It lives in infrastructure and operations storage solutions, where it provides a shared storage layer across distributed nodes rather than a single local disk.
About Alarik
Alarik is a high performance, self hosted S3 compatible object storage system written in Swift and licensed under Apache 2.0, built for developers and platform teams that want an open alternative to MinIO and RustFS.
read the full Alarik overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Ceph or Alarik more popular?
Ceph has 17,050 GitHub stars and Alarik has 538. Ceph has the larger community by that measure.
Are Ceph and Alarik free?
Both are open source. Ceph has no licence declared in this registry, and Alarik is licensed under Apache-2.0. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Ceph and Alarik?
Ceph is written in C++ and Alarik in Swift. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Ceph or Alarik?
Choose Ceph if you want the larger community (17,050 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose Alarik if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.