head to head · open source
Qdrant vs Dragonfly
Qdrant has 34,650 GitHub stars, 2,682 forks, 704 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. Dragonfly has 31,579 stars, 1,264 forks, 308 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. Qdrant leads on adoption by 10% (34,650 vs 31,579 stars). Qdrant is written in Rust under Apache-2.0; Dragonfly is written in C++ under a custom or non-standard licence. Qdrant has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, Dragonfly 4%. Qdrant 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
| Qdrant | Dragonfly | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 35K | ★ 32K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Custom / other |
| Written in | Rust | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.7K | ⑂ 1.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Qdrant if
- You weight community size — 35K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Dragonfly if
- You want the Dragonfly feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and Dragonfly fits your workflow better
About Qdrant
Qdrant is a vector similarity search engine and database built in Rust, designed for production use in AI applications. It stores, manages, and retrieves high dimensional vectors alongside associated metadata (payloads), supporting fast nearest neighbor search with filtering. It solves the problem of efficiently performing semantic or neural based matching at scale—such as finding similar images, recommending content, or powering retrieval augmented generation (RAG)—by replacing slow or inflexible brute force or index based approaches with a purpose built engine optimized for vector operations.…
read the full Qdrant overview →
About Dragonfly
Dragonfly is a C++ in memory data store that speaks the Redis and Memcached APIs, built for teams that want more throughput and lower resource use from an existing cache or key value workload without changing application code.
read the full Dragonfly overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Qdrant or Dragonfly more popular?
Qdrant has 34,650 GitHub stars and Dragonfly has 31,579. Qdrant has the larger community by that measure.
Are Qdrant and Dragonfly free?
Both are open source. Qdrant is licensed under Apache-2.0, and Dragonfly has no licence declared in this registry. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Qdrant and Dragonfly?
Qdrant is written in Rust and Dragonfly in C++. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Qdrant or Dragonfly?
Choose Qdrant if you want the larger community (34,650 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose Dragonfly if its feature set, stack or Custom / other licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.