Back In Time vs bitmagnet
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted backup & recovery options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Back In Time
Simple backup tool inspired by Apple Time Machine
VS
bitmagnet
BitTorrent indexer, DHT crawler, content classifier and torrent search
| Feature | Back In Time | bitmagnet |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Backup & Recovery | Backup & Recovery |
| License | GPL-2.0 | MIT |
| Language | Python | Go |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 128 MB | 512 MB |
| Deployment | binary | docker |
| GitHub stars | ★ 2,641 | ★ 4,265 |
| First released | 2008 | 2026 |
| Replaces | Time Machine | — |
Why pick each one
Choose Back In Time if…
- Released under the GPL-2.0 license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- Active community (2.6k GitHub stars)
- Written in Python
Choose bitmagnet if…
- Released under the MIT license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (4.3k GitHub stars)
- Written in Go
Frequently asked questions
Is Back In Time or bitmagnet better?
Neither is universally better. bitmagnet has the larger community, while Back In Time is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Back In Time and bitmagnet free and open-source?
Yes. Back In Time is licensed under GPL-2.0 and bitmagnet under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Back In Time and bitmagnet with Docker?
Back In Time: check the project docs for container support. bitmagnet: yes.