Autorestic vs Duplicati
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted backup & recovery options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Duplicati
Free backup software with a friendly web UI
| Feature | Autorestic | Duplicati |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 52 · Fair | 95 · Excellent |
| Category | Backup & Recovery | Backup & Recovery |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Language | Go | C# |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 64 MB | 256 MB |
| Deployment | docker, binary | docker, bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,868 | ★ 15,020 |
| First released | 2019 | 2008 |
| Replaces | Backblaze, CrashPlan | Backblaze, Carbonite |
What are Autorestic and Duplicati?
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
Duplicati
Duplicati is free backup software that stores encrypted, incremental backups to cloud and local destinations through a web interface. It targets users who want scheduled GUI-driven backups. It is deployed via Docker or installers.
- Web-based backup management
- Encrypted incremental backups
- Many cloud storage targets
- Scheduling built in
Autorestic vs Duplicati: key differences
Autorestic is written in Go, while Duplicati is built with C#. Licensing differs — Apache-2.0 for Autorestic versus MIT for Duplicati. Autorestic is the lighter option, starting around 64 MB of RAM against 256 MB for Duplicati. Duplicati is the more established project (first released 2008), while Autorestic arrived in 2019. Duplicati has the considerably larger community, at 15,020 GitHub stars versus 1,868.
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 Duplicati if…
- Friendly GUI
- Broad storage support
- Free
Watch out for
- Restores can be slow
- Long beta history
Frequently asked questions
Is Autorestic or Duplicati better?
Neither is universally better. Duplicati has the larger community; both share a easy setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Autorestic and Duplicati free and open-source?
Yes. Autorestic is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Duplicati under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Autorestic and Duplicati with Docker?
Autorestic: yes. Duplicati: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Autorestic or Duplicati?
Autorestic has the smaller minimum footprint at 64 MB of RAM, compared to about 256 MB for Duplicati. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.