head to head · open source
debezium vs Elementary Data
debezium has 13,129 GitHub stars, 3,042 forks, 131 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Elementary Data has 2,410 stars, 226 forks, 12 open issues and last shipped yesterday. debezium leads on adoption by 445% (13,129 vs 2,410 stars). debezium is written in Java under Apache-2.0; Elementary Data is written in HTML under Apache-2.0. debezium has attracted 23% as many forks as stars, Elementary Data 9%. debezium was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (data-pipeline), 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
| debezium | Elementary Data | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 13K | ★ 2.4K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Java | HTML |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.0K | ⑂ 226 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick debezium if
- You weight community size — 13K 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 Elementary Data if
- You want the Elementary Data feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches HTML
- You evaluated both and Elementary Data fits your workflow better
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 →
About Elementary Data
Elementary Data is an open source, dbt native data observability tool for data and analytics engineers. It lives in the dbt and modern data warehouse ecosystem, and it is distributed as a CLI that works alongside the Elementary dbt package. The project is licensed under Apache 2.0, is written primarily in HTML, and is maintained by the Elementary team with a homepage at elementary data.com and documentation at docs.elementary data.com.
read the full Elementary Data overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is debezium or Elementary Data more popular?
debezium has 13,129 GitHub stars and Elementary Data has 2,410. debezium has the larger community by that measure.
Are debezium and Elementary Data free?
Both are open source. debezium is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Elementary Data under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between debezium and Elementary Data?
debezium is written in Java and Elementary Data in HTML. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, debezium or Elementary Data?
Choose debezium if you want the larger community (13,129 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose Elementary Data if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.