head to head · open source
serviette vs faiss
serviette has 58,732 GitHub stars, 1,547 forks, 8 open issues and last shipped yesterday. faiss has 41,251 stars, 4,584 forks, 327 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. serviette leads on adoption by 42% (58,732 vs 41,251 stars). serviette is written in Python under MIT; faiss is written in C++ under MIT. serviette has attracted 3% as many forks as stars, faiss 11%. serviette 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
| serviette | faiss | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 59K | ★ 41K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | Python | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-01 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.5K | ⑂ 4.6K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick serviette if
- You weight community size — 59K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick faiss if
- You want the faiss feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and faiss fits your workflow better
About serviette
serviette Looking for llm app templates? All templates, cookbooks and examples are still available in full in the Pathway repository under examples/llm app . A no code, always up to date RAG server for any vector database — built on the Pathway Live Data Framework. Point serviette at a folder of documents, pick a vector database and an embedder in one YAML file, and run two commands: you get a chat and a REST API that answer from those documents and cite their sources. From then on, any change to the documents — an edit, a new file, a deletion — is reflected in the answers within seconds. serviette runs on…
read the full serviette overview →
About faiss
Faiss Faiss is a library for efficient similarity search and clustering of dense vectors. It contains algorithms that search in sets of vectors of any size, up to ones that possibly do not fit in RAM. It also contains supporting code for evaluation and parameter tuning. Faiss is written in C++ with complete wrappers for Python/numpy. Some of the most useful algorithms are implemented on the GPU. It is developed primarily at Meta's Fundamental AI Research group. News See CHANGELOG.md for detailed information about latest features. Introduction Faiss contains several methods for similarity search. It assumes that…
read the full faiss overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is serviette or faiss more popular?
serviette has 58,732 GitHub stars and faiss has 41,251. serviette has the larger community by that measure.
Are serviette and faiss free?
Both are open source. serviette is licensed under MIT and faiss under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between serviette and faiss?
serviette is written in Python and faiss 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, serviette or faiss?
Choose serviette if you want the larger community (58,732 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose faiss if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.