head to head · open source
rclone vs psitransfer
rclone has 60,027 GitHub stars, 5,461 forks, 1,273 open issues and last shipped yesterday. psitransfer has 1,953 stars, 247 forks, 109 open issues and last shipped 4 months ago. rclone leads on adoption by 2,974% (60,027 vs 1,953 stars). rclone is written in Go under MIT; psitransfer is written in JavaScript under BSD-2-Clause. rclone has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, psitransfer 13%. rclone 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
| rclone | psitransfer | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 60K | ★ 2.0K |
| License | MIT | BSD-2-Clause |
| Written in | Go | JavaScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-30 | 2026-06-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.5K | ⑂ 247 |
| 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 psitransfer if
- You want the psitransfer feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the BSD-2-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You evaluated both and psitransfer 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 psitransfer
PsiTransfer is a simple, open source, self hosted file sharing service written in JavaScript under the BSD 2 Clause licence, intended for individuals and teams that want to send large files without accounts, logins or a paid provider.
read the full psitransfer overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is rclone or psitransfer more popular?
rclone has 60,027 GitHub stars and psitransfer has 1,953. rclone has the larger community by that measure.
Are rclone and psitransfer free?
Both are open source. rclone is licensed under MIT and psitransfer under BSD-2-Clause. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between rclone and psitransfer?
rclone is written in Go and psitransfer in JavaScript. 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 psitransfer?
Choose rclone if you want the larger community (60,027 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose psitransfer if its feature set, stack or BSD-2-Clause licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.