head to head · open source
rclone vs yazi
rclone has 59,830 GitHub stars, 5,407 forks, 1,273 open issues and last shipped yesterday. yazi has 42,278 stars, 1,022 forks, 65 open issues and last shipped yesterday. rclone leads on adoption by 42% (59,830 vs 42,278 stars). rclone is written in Go under MIT; yazi is written in Rust under MIT. rclone has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, yazi 2%. yazi 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 | yazi | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 60K | ★ 42K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | Go | Rust |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-18 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.4K | ⑂ 1.0K |
| 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 yazi if
- You want the yazi feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You evaluated both and yazi 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 yazi
Yazi is a terminal file manager written in Rust on non blocking async I/O, aimed at developers and command line users who want fast, customizable file browsing without leaving the terminal.
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Frequently asked questions
Is rclone or yazi more popular?
rclone has 59,830 GitHub stars and yazi has 42,278. rclone has the larger community by that measure.
Are rclone and yazi free?
Both are open source. rclone is licensed under MIT and yazi under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between rclone and yazi?
rclone is written in Go and yazi in Rust. 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 yazi?
Choose rclone if you want the larger community (59,830 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose yazi if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.