head to head · open source
Seafile vs cryfs
Seafile has 15,257 GitHub stars, 1,677 forks, 94 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. cryfs has 2,304 stars, 170 forks, 154 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Seafile leads on adoption by 562% (15,257 vs 2,304 stars). Seafile is written in C under a custom or non-standard licence; cryfs is written in Rust under LGPL-3.0. Seafile has attracted 11% as many forks as stars, cryfs 7%. cryfs was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (cloud-storage), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
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
| Seafile | cryfs | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 15K | ★ 2.3K |
| License | Custom / other | LGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | C | Rust |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-19 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.7K | ⑂ 170 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Seafile if
- You weight community size — 15K 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 cryfs if
- You want the cryfs feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the LGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You evaluated both and cryfs fits your workflow better
About Seafile
Seafile is an open source cloud storage system written in C and positioned as a self hosted alternative to Dropbox and Google Drive. It organizes files into libraries, each of which can be synced separately, encrypted with a user chosen password, and shared between users or groups. The project lives in the self hosted file sync and document management ecosystem, where it combines storage, collaboration, knowledge management, and metadata features.
read the full Seafile overview →
About cryfs
CryFS is a FUSE based cryptographic filesystem written in Rust that encrypts a vault directory so it can be stored safely in cloud services such as Dropbox, iCloud, or OneDrive, and it is intended for Linux users who want their file contents, file sizes, directory structure, and metadata hidden from the storage provider rather than encrypted one file at a time.
read the full cryfs overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Seafile or cryfs more popular?
Seafile has 15,257 GitHub stars and cryfs has 2,304. Seafile has the larger community by that measure.
Are Seafile and cryfs free?
Both are open source. Seafile has no licence declared in this registry, and cryfs is licensed under LGPL-3.0. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Seafile and cryfs?
Seafile is written in C and cryfs in Rust. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Seafile or cryfs?
Choose Seafile if you want the larger community (15,257 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose cryfs if its feature set, stack or LGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.