head to head · open source
etcd vs acl
etcd has 52,270 GitHub stars, 10,506 forks, 351 open issues and last shipped yesterday. acl has 3,105 stars, 951 forks, 40 open issues and last shipped 5 days ago. etcd leads on adoption by 1,583% (52,270 vs 3,105 stars). etcd is written in Go under Apache-2.0; acl is written in C under LGPL-2.1. etcd has attracted 20% as many forks as stars, acl 31%. etcd was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (database), 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
| etcd | acl | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 52K | ★ 3.1K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | LGPL-2.1 |
| Written in | Go | C |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-14 |
| Forks | ⑂ 11K | ⑂ 951 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick etcd if
- You weight community size — 52K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick acl if
- You want the acl feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the LGPL-2.1 license terms
- Your stack matches C
- You evaluated both and acl fits your workflow better
About etcd
etcd is an Apache 2.0 licensed, Go written distributed key value store that holds the most critical data of a distributed system in a Raft replicated log, aimed at the platform and infrastructure engineers who must keep that control plane data consistent and available.
About acl
Acl (Advanced C/C++ Library, "Advanced Cross Platform C/C++ Network Communication Library and Server Framework") is a cross platform C network communication library and server framework, with coroutine, HTTP/HTTPS/WebSocket, MQTT, SMTP, Redis, Memcached and MySQL/PostgreSQL/SQLite support, built for developers writing network servers and clients on Linux, Windows, Solaris, FreeBSD, macOS, Android, iOS and HarmonyOS.
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Frequently asked questions
Is etcd or acl more popular?
etcd has 52,270 GitHub stars and acl has 3,105. etcd has the larger community by that measure.
Are etcd and acl free?
Both are open source. etcd is licensed under Apache-2.0 and acl under LGPL-2.1. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between etcd and acl?
etcd is written in Go and acl 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, etcd or acl?
Choose etcd if you want the larger community (52,270 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose acl if its feature set, stack or LGPL-2.1 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.