head to head · open source
Prometheus vs citus
Prometheus has 66,109 GitHub stars, 10,839 forks, 890 open issues and last shipped yesterday. citus has 12,776 stars, 795 forks, 1,075 open issues and last shipped today. Prometheus leads on adoption by 417% (66,109 vs 12,776 stars). Prometheus is written in Go under Apache-2.0; citus is written in C under AGPL-3.0. Prometheus has attracted 16% as many forks as stars, citus 6%. citus 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
| Prometheus | citus | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 66K | ★ 13K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Go | C |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-18 |
| Forks | ⑂ 11K | ⑂ 795 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Prometheus if
- You weight community size — 66K 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 citus if
- You want the citus feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C
- You evaluated both and citus fits your workflow better
About Prometheus
Prometheus is an open source monitoring system and time series database, part of the Cloud Native Computing Foundation ecosystem. It collects metrics from configured targets at defined intervals, evaluates alerting rules, and visualizes results. Designed for reliability in dynamic environments, it operates without reliance on distributed storage, ensuring each server node functions independently.
read the full Prometheus overview →
About citus
Citus is an AGPL 3.0 licensed PostgreSQL extension, written in C, that turns an ordinary Postgres server into a distributed database for teams whose applications have outgrown a single PostgreSQL node.
read the full citus overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Prometheus or citus more popular?
Prometheus has 66,109 GitHub stars and citus has 12,776. Prometheus has the larger community by that measure.
Are Prometheus and citus free?
Both are open source. Prometheus is licensed under Apache-2.0 and citus under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Prometheus and citus?
Prometheus is written in Go and citus 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, Prometheus or citus?
Choose Prometheus if you want the larger community (66,109 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose citus if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.