head to head · open source
etcd vs mycli
etcd has 52,270 GitHub stars, 10,506 forks, 351 open issues and last shipped today. mycli has 11,976 stars, 699 forks, 0 open issues and last shipped yesterday. etcd leads on adoption by 336% (52,270 vs 11,976 stars). etcd is written in Go under Apache-2.0; mycli is written in Python under BSD-3-Clause. etcd has attracted 20% as many forks as stars, mycli 6%. 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 | mycli | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 52K | ★ 12K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | BSD-3-Clause |
| Written in | Go | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 11K | ⑂ 699 |
| 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 mycli if
- You want the mycli feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the BSD-3-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and mycli 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 mycli
mycli is a rich terminal client for MySQL compatible databases, aimed at developers, data scientists, and operators who want auto completion, syntax highlighting, and dataframe tooling inside an interactive SQL shell.
read the full mycli overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is etcd or mycli more popular?
etcd has 52,270 GitHub stars and mycli has 11,976. etcd has the larger community by that measure.
Are etcd and mycli free?
Both are open source. etcd is licensed under Apache-2.0 and mycli under BSD-3-Clause. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between etcd and mycli?
etcd is written in Go and mycli in Python. 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 mycli?
Choose etcd if you want the larger community (52,270 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose mycli if its feature set, stack or BSD-3-Clause licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.