head to head · open source
Prometheus vs Apache IoTDB
Prometheus has 66,906 GitHub stars, 10,969 forks, 890 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Apache IoTDB has 6,425 stars, 1,163 forks, 734 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Prometheus leads on adoption by 941% (66,906 vs 6,425 stars). Prometheus is written in Go under Apache-2.0; Apache IoTDB is written in Java under Apache-2.0. Prometheus has attracted 16% as many forks as stars, Apache IoTDB 18%. Prometheus 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.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| Prometheus | Apache IoTDB | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 67K | ★ 6.4K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Java |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 11K | ⑂ 1.2K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Prometheus if
- You weight community size — 67K 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 Apache IoTDB if
- You want the Apache IoTDB feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You evaluated both and Apache IoTDB fits your workflow better
About Prometheus
Prometheus Visit prometheus.io for the full documentation, examples and guides. [ ][quay] [ ][hub] Prometheus, a Cloud Native Computing Foundation project, is a systems and service monitoring system. It collects metrics from configured targets at given intervals, evaluates rule expressions, displays the results, and can trigger alerts when specified conditions are observed. The features that distinguish Prometheus from other metrics and monitoring systems are: A multi dimensional data model (time series defined by metric name and set of key/value dimensions) PromQL, a powerful and flexible query language to…
read the full Prometheus overview →
About Apache IoTDB
English 中文 IoTDB Overview IoTDB (Internet of Things Database) is a data management system for time series data, which provides users with specific services, including data collection, storage and analysis. Due to its lightweight structure, high performance and usable features, together with its seamless integration with the Hadoop and Spark ecosystem, IoTDB meets the requirements of massive dataset storage, high throughput data input, and complex data analysis in the industrial IoT field. Click for More Information IoTDB depends on TsFile which is a columnar storage file format designed for time series data. The…
read the full Apache IoTDB overview →
More in Infrastructure & Operations
Related comparisons
More Databases projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Databases field.
Frequently asked questions
Is Prometheus or Apache IoTDB more popular?
Prometheus has 66,906 GitHub stars and Apache IoTDB has 6,425. Prometheus has the larger community by that measure.
Are Prometheus and Apache IoTDB free?
Both are open source. Prometheus is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Apache IoTDB under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Prometheus and Apache IoTDB?
Prometheus is written in Go and Apache IoTDB in Java. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Prometheus or Apache IoTDB?
Choose Prometheus if you want the larger community (66,906 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose Apache IoTDB if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.