Backrest vs Restic
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted backup & recovery options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Backrest
Web UI and orchestrator for Restic backups
VS
Restic
Fast, secure, efficient backup program
| Feature | Backrest | Restic |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 91 · Excellent | 99 · Excellent |
| Category | Backup & Recovery | Backup & Recovery |
| License | GPL-3.0 | BSD-2-Clause |
| Language | TypeScript | Go |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 256 MB |
| Deployment | docker, binary | binary, docker |
| GitHub stars | ★ 7,389 | ★ 36,194 |
| First released | 2024 | 2015 |
| Replaces | Backblaze | Backblaze, Carbonite |
What are Backrest and Restic?
Backrest
Backrest is a web-based backup orchestrator built on top of Restic, adding scheduling, monitoring, and a friendly interface. It targets users who want Restic's power with a GUI. It is deployed via Docker or a binary.
- Web UI for Restic
- Scheduling and retention policies
- Backup health monitoring
- Notifications
Restic
Restic is a fast and secure backup program that creates encrypted, deduplicated snapshots to many storage backends. It targets users and admins who want reliable command-line backups. It is deployed as a single binary.
- Encrypted deduplicated snapshots
- Many storage backends
- Fast incremental backups
- Single self-contained binary
Backrest vs Restic: key differences
Backrest is written in TypeScript, while Restic is built with Go. Licensing differs — GPL-3.0 for Backrest versus BSD-2-Clause for Restic. Restic is the more established project (first released 2015), while Backrest arrived in 2024. Restic has the considerably larger community, at 36,194 GitHub stars versus 7,389.
Why pick each one
Choose Backrest if…
- Makes Restic approachable
- Good scheduling
- Lightweight
Watch out for
- Young project
- Depends on Restic underneath
Choose Restic if…
- Strong encryption
- Efficient deduplication
- Wide backend support
Watch out for
- Command-line only
- No built-in scheduler
Frequently asked questions
Is Backrest or Restic better?
Neither is universally better. Restic has the larger community, while Backrest is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Backrest and Restic free and open-source?
Yes. Backrest is licensed under GPL-3.0 and Restic under BSD-2-Clause. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Backrest and Restic with Docker?
Backrest: yes. Restic: yes.