Autorestic vs BackupNinja
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted backup & recovery options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | Autorestic | BackupNinja |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Read-the-docs project |
| Health score | 52 · Fair | 2 · At risk |
| Status | Actively maintained | Archived |
| Category | Backup & Recovery | Backup & Recovery |
| License | Apache-2.0 | GPL-2.0 |
| Language | Go | Shell |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 64 MB | 64 MB |
| Deployment | docker, binary | bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,868 | ★ 68 |
| First released | 2019 | 2004 |
| Replaces | Backblaze, CrashPlan | CrashPlan |
What are Autorestic and BackupNinja?
Autorestic
Autorestic is a higher-level wrapper around Restic that makes it easy to manage multiple backups from a single declarative configuration file. It handles backends, locations, and scheduling.
- Declarative backup config
- Multiple backends and locations
- Cron-based scheduling
BackupNinja
Backupninja lets you coordinate system backups through a central configuration directory of simple files. It supports many backends including rdiff-backup, rsync, duplicity, and database dumps.
- Central config directory
- Many backup backends
- Database dump handlers
Autorestic vs BackupNinja: key differences
The biggest difference is maintenance: BackupNinja's repository is archived and no longer developed, while Autorestic is actively maintained. Autorestic is written in Go, while BackupNinja is built with Shell. Licensing differs — Apache-2.0 for Autorestic versus GPL-2.0 for BackupNinja. BackupNinja is the more established project (first released 2004), while Autorestic arrived in 2019. Autorestic has the considerably larger community, at 1,868 GitHub stars versus 68. Autorestic lists first-class Docker deployment; BackupNinja does not.
Why pick each one
Choose Autorestic if…
- Released under the Apache-2.0 license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (1.9k GitHub stars)
Choose BackupNinja if…
- Released under the GPL-2.0 license
- Written in Shell
- Tiny footprint — runs in 64 MB RAM
Frequently asked questions
Is Autorestic or BackupNinja better?
Autorestic is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler easy setup. Consider BackupNinja if its specific feature set fits your needs better.
Are Autorestic and BackupNinja free and open-source?
Yes. Autorestic is licensed under Apache-2.0 and BackupNinja under GPL-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Autorestic and BackupNinja with Docker?
Autorestic: yes. BackupNinja: check the project docs for container support.