head to head · open source
Prefect vs dtm
Prefect has 24,114 GitHub stars, 2,632 forks, 858 open issues and last shipped yesterday. dtm has 10,933 stars, 997 forks, 87 open issues and last shipped 10 months ago. Prefect leads on adoption by 121% (24,114 vs 10,933 stars). Prefect is written in Python under Apache-2.0; dtm is written in Go under BSD-3-Clause. Prefect has attracted 11% as many forks as stars, dtm 9%. Prefect 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
| Prefect | dtm | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 24K | ★ 11K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | BSD-3-Clause |
| Written in | Python | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-04 | 2026-01-03 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.6K | ⑂ 997 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Prefect if
- You weight community size — 24K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick dtm if
- You want the dtm feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the BSD-3-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and dtm fits your workflow better
About Prefect
Installation · Quickstart · Build workflows · Deploy workflows · Prefect Cloud Prefect Prefect is a workflow orchestration framework for building data pipelines in Python. It's the simplest way to elevate a script into a production workflow. With Prefect, you can build resilient, dynamic data pipelines that react to the world around them and recover from unexpected changes. With just a few lines of code, data teams can confidently automate any data process with features such as scheduling, caching, retries, and event based automations. Workflow activity is tracked and can be monitored with a self hosted Prefect…
read the full Prefect overview →
About dtm
English 简体中文 Distributed Transactions Manager What is DTM DTM is a distributed transaction framework which provides cross service eventual data consistency. It provides saga, tcc, xa, 2 phase message, outbox, workflow patterns for a variety of application scenarios. It also supports multiple languages and multiple store engine to form up a transaction as following: Who's using DTM (partial) Tencent Bytedance Ivydad More Features Support for multiple transaction modes: SAGA, TCC, XA, Workflow, Outbox Multiple languages support: SDK for Go, Java, PHP, C , Python, Nodejs Better Outbox: 2 phase messages, a more…
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Frequently asked questions
Is Prefect or dtm more popular?
Prefect has 24,114 GitHub stars and dtm has 10,933. Prefect has the larger community by that measure.
Are Prefect and dtm free?
Both are open source. Prefect is licensed under Apache-2.0 and dtm under BSD-3-Clause. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Prefect and dtm?
Prefect is written in Python and dtm 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, Prefect or dtm?
Choose Prefect if you want the larger community (24,114 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose dtm if its feature set, stack or BSD-3-Clause licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.