head to head · open source
rclone vs Seafile
rclone has 59,830 GitHub stars, 5,407 forks, 1,273 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Seafile has 15,256 stars, 1,677 forks, 94 open issues and last shipped yesterday. rclone leads on adoption by 292% (59,830 vs 15,256 stars). rclone is written in Go under MIT; Seafile is written in C under a custom or non-standard licence. rclone has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, Seafile 11%. rclone was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (cloud-storage), 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 | Seafile | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 60K | ★ 15K |
| License | MIT | Custom / other |
| Written in | Go | C |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-18 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.4K | ⑂ 1.7K |
| 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 Seafile if
- You want the Seafile feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches C
- You evaluated both and Seafile 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 Seafile
Seafile is an open source cloud storage system written in C and positioned as a self hosted alternative to Dropbox and Google Drive. It organizes files into libraries, each of which can be synced separately, encrypted with a user chosen password, and shared between users or groups. The project lives in the self hosted file sync and document management ecosystem, where it combines storage, collaboration, knowledge management, and metadata features.
read the full Seafile overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is rclone or Seafile more popular?
rclone has 59,830 GitHub stars and Seafile has 15,256. rclone has the larger community by that measure.
Are rclone and Seafile free?
Both are open source. rclone is licensed under MIT, and Seafile has no licence declared in this registry. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between rclone and Seafile?
rclone is written in Go and Seafile 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, rclone or Seafile?
Choose rclone if you want the larger community (59,830 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose Seafile if its feature set, stack or Custom / other licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.