head to head · open source
etcd vs finagle
etcd has 52,441 GitHub stars, 10,552 forks, 351 open issues and last shipped yesterday. finagle has 8,869 stars, 1,426 forks, 65 open issues and last shipped 3 months ago. etcd leads on adoption by 491% (52,441 vs 8,869 stars). etcd is written in Go under Apache-2.0; finagle is written in Scala under Apache-2.0. etcd has attracted 20% as many forks as stars, finagle 16%. etcd was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (distributed-systems), 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 | finagle | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 52K | ★ 8.9K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Scala |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-08-13 |
| Forks | ⑂ 11K | ⑂ 1.4K |
| 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 finagle if
- You want the finagle feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Scala
- You evaluated both and finagle fits your workflow better
About etcd
etcd Note : The main branch may be in an unstable or even broken state during development. For stable versions, see [releases][github release]. etcd is a distributed reliable key value store for the most critical data of a distributed system, with a focus on being: Simple : well defined, user facing API (gRPC) Secure : automatic TLS with optional client cert authentication Fast : benchmarked 10,000 writes/sec Reliable : properly distributed using Raft etcd is written in Go and uses the [Raft][] consensus algorithm to manage a highly available replicated log. etcd is used in production by many companies, and the…
About finagle
Finagle Status This project is used in production at Twitter (and many other organizations), and is being actively developed and maintained. Releases Releases are done on an approximately monthly schedule. While semver is not followed, the changelogs are detailed and include sections on public API breaks and changes in runtime behavior. Getting involved Website: Source: Mailing List: finaglers@googlegroups.com Chat: Blog: Finagle is an extensible RPC system for the JVM, used to construct high concurrency servers. Finagle implements uniform client and server APIs for several protocols, and is designed for high…
read the full finagle overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is etcd or finagle more popular?
etcd has 52,441 GitHub stars and finagle has 8,869. etcd has the larger community by that measure.
Are etcd and finagle free?
Both are open source. etcd is licensed under Apache-2.0 and finagle under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between etcd and finagle?
etcd is written in Go and finagle in Scala. 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 finagle?
Choose etcd if you want the larger community (52,441 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose finagle if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.