head to head · open source
NetData vs Zabbix
NetData has 81,255 GitHub stars, 6,717 forks, 393 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Zabbix has 6,529 stars, 1,275 forks, 108 open issues and last shipped yesterday. NetData leads on adoption by 1,145% (81,255 vs 6,529 stars). NetData is written in Go under GPL-3.0; Zabbix is written in Go Template under AGPL-3.0. NetData has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, Zabbix 20%. NetData was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (alerting), 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
| NetData | Zabbix | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 81K | ★ 6.5K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Go | Go Template |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.7K | ⑂ 1.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick NetData if
- You weight community size — 81K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Zabbix if
- You want the Zabbix feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go Template
- You evaluated both and Zabbix fits your workflow better
About NetData
X Ray Vision for your infrastructure! Every Metric, Every Second. No BS. Visit our Home Page MENU: WHO WE ARE KEY FEATURES GETTING STARTED HOW IT WORKS FAQ DOCS COMMUNITY CONTRIBUTE LICENSE [!WARNING] People get addicted to Netdata. Once you use it on your systems, there's no going back. WHO WE ARE Netdata is an open source, real time infrastructure monitoring platform. Monitor, detect, and act across your entire infrastructure. Core Advantages: Instant Insights – With Netdata you can access per second metrics and visualizations. Zero Configuration – You can deploy immediately without complex setup. ML Powered –…
read the full NetData overview →
About Zabbix
An enterprise class, open source distributed monitoring solution that’s designed to monitor the performance and availability of network devices, servers, services, and other IT resources. Zabbix is a flexible solution that can monitor anything from a simple, standalone application to a large scale environment, with features including: Resource discovery: Discover network entities, server resources, and onboard/offboard devices. Use out of the box integrations (templates) to monitor anything form a low level device to a SAAS service. Metric acquisition: Use an agent or agent less approach for metric acquisition…
read the full Zabbix overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is NetData or Zabbix more popular?
NetData has 81,255 GitHub stars and Zabbix has 6,529. NetData has the larger community by that measure.
Are NetData and Zabbix free?
Both are open source. NetData is licensed under GPL-3.0 and Zabbix under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between NetData and Zabbix?
NetData is written in Go and Zabbix in Go Template. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, NetData or Zabbix?
Choose NetData if you want the larger community (81,255 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose Zabbix if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.