head to head · open source
rclone vs ownCloud
rclone has 59,844 GitHub stars, 5,413 forks, 1,273 open issues and last shipped yesterday. ownCloud has 2,124 stars, 274 forks, 628 open issues and last shipped today. rclone leads on adoption by 2,718% (59,844 vs 2,124 stars). rclone is written in Go under MIT; ownCloud is written in Go under Apache-2.0. rclone has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, ownCloud 13%. ownCloud 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
| rclone | ownCloud | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 60K | ★ 2.1K |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-19 | 2026-09-20 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.4K | ⑂ 274 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick rclone if
- You weight community size — 60K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick ownCloud if
- You want the ownCloud feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and ownCloud fits your workflow better
About rclone
Rclone is an MIT licensed, Go based command line program that syncs files and directories to and from cloud storage providers, built for anyone who needs one tool for many backends instead of a separate client for every service.
read the full rclone overview →
About ownCloud
ownCloud Infinite Scale (oCIS) is a self hosted file sync and share server written in Go under the Apache 2.0 license. It lives in the ownCloud ecosystem and uses reva as a scalable backend with open APIs such as WebDAV and CS3. It presents itself as the foundation for a data management platform and as an open alternative to Google Workspace and Google Drive.
read the full ownCloud overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is rclone or ownCloud more popular?
rclone has 59,844 GitHub stars and ownCloud has 2,124. rclone has the larger community by that measure.
Are rclone and ownCloud free?
Both are open source. rclone is licensed under MIT and ownCloud under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between rclone and ownCloud?
rclone is written in Go and ownCloud 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, rclone or ownCloud?
Choose rclone if you want the larger community (59,844 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose ownCloud if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.