head to head · open source
frp vs restic
frp has 109,830 GitHub stars, 15,239 forks, 48 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. restic has 36,523 stars, 1,918 forks, 622 open issues and last shipped yesterday. frp leads on adoption by 201% (109,830 vs 36,523 stars). frp is written in Go under Apache-2.0; restic is written in Go under BSD-2-Clause. frp has attracted 14% as many forks as stars, restic 5%. restic was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (go), 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
| frp | restic | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 110K | ★ 37K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | BSD-2-Clause |
| Written in | Go | Go |
| Last push | 2026-10-10 | 2026-10-11 |
| Forks | ⑂ 15K | ⑂ 1.9K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick frp if
- You weight community size — 110K 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 restic if
- You want the restic feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the BSD-2-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and restic fits your workflow better
About frp
frp is a fast reverse proxy written in Go that exposes a local server behind a NAT or firewall to the internet, built for operators and developers who need inbound access to machines they cannot port forward.
About restic
restic is a fast, secure, efficient backup program written in Go for Linux, macOS, Windows, FreeBSD and OpenBSD users who want verifiable, encrypted backups stored to a backend of their choosing.
read the full restic overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is frp or restic more popular?
frp has 109,830 GitHub stars and restic has 36,523. frp has the larger community by that measure.
Are frp and restic free?
Both are open source. frp is licensed under Apache-2.0 and restic under BSD-2-Clause. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between frp and restic?
frp is written in Go and restic 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, frp or restic?
Choose frp if you want the larger community (109,830 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose restic if its feature set, stack or BSD-2-Clause licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.