head to head · open source
lancedb vs server
lancedb has 11,841 GitHub stars, 1,150 forks, 627 open issues and last shipped yesterday. server has 8,524 stars, 2,267 forks, 495 open issues and last shipped yesterday. lancedb leads on adoption by 39% (11,841 vs 8,524 stars). lancedb is written in Rust under Apache-2.0; server is written in C++ under GPL-2.0. lancedb has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, server 27%. lancedb was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (nearest-neighbor-search), 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
| lancedb | server | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 12K | ★ 8.5K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | GPL-2.0 |
| Written in | Rust | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-11-04 | 2026-11-04 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.1K | ⑂ 2.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick lancedb if
- You weight community size — 12K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick server if
- You want the server feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and server fits your workflow better
About lancedb
The Multimodal AI Lakehouse How to Install ✦ Detailed Documentation ✦ Tutorials and Recipes ✦ Contributors The ultimate multimodal data platform for AI/ML applications. LanceDB is designed for fast, scalable, and production ready vector search. It is built on top of the Lance columnar format. You can store, index, and search over petabytes of multimodal data and vectors with ease. LanceDB is a central location where developers can build, train and analyze their AI workloads. Demo: Multimodal Search by Keyword, Vector or with SQL Star LanceDB to get updates! ⭐ Click here ⭐ to see how fast we're growing! Key…
read the full lancedb overview →
About server
MariaDB Server MariaDB Server is one of the most widely deployed open source relational databases. It is built by a global community of contributors together with the MariaDB Foundation and MariaDB plc, and it powers workloads from small applications to large scale production systems. MariaDB began as a fork of MySQL, led by the original MySQL developers, and it maintains a high degree of MySQL compatibility. It has since grown into a database with its own capabilities, including native vector search, multiple pluggable storage engines, synchronous clustering, and analytical features, while remaining a…
read the full server overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is lancedb or server more popular?
lancedb has 11,841 GitHub stars and server has 8,524. lancedb has the larger community by that measure.
Are lancedb and server free?
Both are open source. lancedb is licensed under Apache-2.0 and server under GPL-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between lancedb and server?
lancedb is written in Rust and server 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, lancedb or server?
Choose lancedb if you want the larger community (11,841 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose server if its feature set, stack or GPL-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.