head to head · open source
Vector vs node_exporter
Vector has 22,793 GitHub stars, 2,371 forks, 2,512 open issues and last shipped yesterday. node_exporter has 13,893 stars, 2,744 forks, 314 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. Vector leads on adoption by 64% (22,793 vs 13,893 stars). Vector is written in Rust under MPL-2.0; node_exporter is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Vector has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, node_exporter 20%. Vector was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (metrics), 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
| Vector | node_exporter | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 23K | ★ 14K |
| License | MPL-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Rust | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-04 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.4K | ⑂ 2.7K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Vector if
- You weight community size — 23K stars and counting
- You want the MPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick node_exporter if
- You want the node_exporter 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 node_exporter fits your workflow better
About Vector
Quickstart • Docs • Guides • Integrations • Chat • Download • Container Images • Rust Crate Docs What is Vector? Vector is a high performance, end to end (agent & aggregator) observability data pipeline that puts you in control of your observability data. [Collect][docs.sources], [transform][docs.transforms], and [route][docs.sinks] all your logs and metrics to any vendors you want today and any other vendors you may want tomorrow. Vector enables dramatic cost reduction, novel data enrichment, and data security where you need it, not where it is most convenient for your…
read the full Vector overview →
About node_exporter
Node exporter [ ][quay] [ ][hub] [ ][goreportcard] Prometheus exporter for hardware and OS metrics exposed by \ NIX kernels, written in Go with pluggable metric collectors. The Windows exporter is recommended for Windows users. To expose NVIDIA GPU metrics, prometheus dcgm can be used. Installation and Usage If you are new to Prometheus and node exporter there is a simple step by step guide. The node exporter listens on HTTP port 9100 by default. See the help output for more options. Linux distribution packages On Enterprise Linux (RHEL, CentOS Stream, Rocky Linux, AlmaLinux) and Fedora, node exporter is…
read the full node_exporter overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Vector or node_exporter more popular?
Vector has 22,793 GitHub stars and node_exporter has 13,893. Vector has the larger community by that measure.
Are Vector and node_exporter free?
Both are open source. Vector is licensed under MPL-2.0 and node_exporter under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Vector and node_exporter?
Vector is written in Rust and node_exporter 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, Vector or node_exporter?
Choose Vector if you want the larger community (22,793 stars) or its MPL-2.0 licence terms. Choose node_exporter if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.