head to head · open source
conductor vs database-lab-engine
conductor has 32,207 GitHub stars, 1,010 forks, 253 open issues and last shipped yesterday. database-lab-engine has 2,717 stars, 84 forks, 23 open issues and last shipped yesterday. conductor leads on adoption by 1,085% (32,207 vs 2,717 stars). conductor is written in Java under Apache-2.0; database-lab-engine is written in Go under Apache-2.0. conductor has attracted 3% as many forks as stars, database-lab-engine 3%. conductor 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
| conductor | database-lab-engine | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 32K | ★ 2.7K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Java | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.0K | ⑂ 84 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick conductor if
- You weight community size — 32K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick database-lab-engine if
- You want the database-lab-engine feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and database-lab-engine fits your workflow better
About conductor
Conductor is an Apache 2.0 licensed, event driven agentic workflow engine written in Java that provides durable and highly resilient execution for applications and AI agents, aimed at teams running microservices, AI agents, and adaptive workflow graphs that need orchestration they can version, inspect, and recover.
read the full conductor overview →
About database-lab-engine
Database Lab Engine is an open source Go project that provides database branching and thin cloning for PostgreSQL environments. It lives in the infrastructure and operations ecosystem, around database orchestration, CI/CD, and schema migration workflows. The project lets teams create many PostgreSQL environments from existing databases without copying all data for each environment.
read the full database-lab-engine overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is conductor or database-lab-engine more popular?
conductor has 32,207 GitHub stars and database-lab-engine has 2,717. conductor has the larger community by that measure.
Are conductor and database-lab-engine free?
Both are open source. conductor is licensed under Apache-2.0 and database-lab-engine under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between conductor and database-lab-engine?
conductor is written in Java and database-lab-engine in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, conductor or database-lab-engine?
Choose conductor if you want the larger community (32,207 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose database-lab-engine if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.