head to head · open source

shardingsphere vs realtime

shardingsphere has 20,817 GitHub stars, 6,906 forks, 197 open issues and last shipped yesterday. realtime has 7,673 stars, 479 forks, 78 open issues and last shipped yesterday. shardingsphere leads on adoption by 171% (20,817 vs 7,673 stars). shardingsphere is written in Java under Apache-2.0; realtime is written in Elixir under Apache-2.0. shardingsphere has attracted 33% as many forks as stars, realtime 6%. realtime 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.

shardingsphere ★ 21K realtime ★ 7.7K category Data & Analytics

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Side by side

shardingsphere realtime
GitHub stars ★ 21K ★ 7.7K
License Apache-2.0 Apache-2.0
Written in Java Elixir
Last push 2026-11-02 2026-11-02
Forks ⑂ 6.9K ⑂ 479
Self-hosting Yes Yes
Data ownership Your server Your server

pick shardingsphere if

  • You weight community size — 21K stars and counting
  • You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
  • Your stack matches Java
  • You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance

full shardingsphere profile →

pick realtime if

  • You want the realtime feature set and don't need the biggest community
  • You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
  • Your stack matches Elixir
  • You evaluated both and realtime fits your workflow better

full realtime profile →

About shardingsphere

Apache ShardingSphere Enterprise Distributed Database Ecosystem Building the standards and ecosystem on top of heterogeneous databases, empowering enterprise data architecture transformation Official Website: OVERVIEW Apache ShardingSphere is positioned as Database Plus , a standard and ecosystem built on top of heterogeneous databases. As an operating system layer above databases, ShardingSphere does not create new databases but focuses on maximizing the computing capabilities of existing databases, providing unified data access and enhanced computing capabilities. Database Plus Core Concept : By building a…

read the full shardingsphere overview →

About realtime

Supabase Realtime Send ephemeral messages, track and synchronize shared state, and listen to Postgres changes all over WebSockets. Examples · Request Features · Report Bugs Status This repository focuses on version 2 but you can still access the previous version's code and Docker image. For the latest Docker images go to The codebase is under heavy development and the documentation is constantly evolving. Give it a try and let us know what you think by creating an issue. Watch releases of this repo to get notified of updates. And give us a star if you like it! Overview What is this? This is a server built with…

read the full realtime overview →

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Frequently asked questions

Is shardingsphere or realtime more popular?

shardingsphere has 20,817 GitHub stars and realtime has 7,673. shardingsphere has the larger community by that measure.

Are shardingsphere and realtime free?

Both are open source. shardingsphere is licensed under Apache-2.0 and realtime under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.

What is the difference between shardingsphere and realtime?

shardingsphere is written in Java and realtime in Elixir. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.

Which should I choose, shardingsphere or realtime?

Choose shardingsphere if you want the larger community (20,817 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose realtime if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.