Bareos vs BorgBackup
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?
Bareos
Backup Archiving Recovery Open Sourced
VS
BorgBackup
Deduplicating archiver with compression and encryption
| Feature | Bareos | BorgBackup |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Backup & Recovery | Backup & Recovery |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | BSD-3-Clause |
| Language | C++ | Python |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 1,024 MB | 256 MB |
| Deployment | docker, bare-metal | binary, bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,232 | ★ 13,588 |
| First released | 2010 | 2015 |
| Replaces | Veeam, CommVault | Carbonite, Backblaze |
Why pick each one
Choose Bareos if…
- Released under the AGPL-3.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (1.2k GitHub stars)
- Written in C++
Frequently asked questions
Is Bareos or BorgBackup better?
BorgBackup is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler medium setup. Consider Bareos if its specific feature set fits your needs better.
Are Bareos and BorgBackup free and open-source?
Yes. Bareos is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and BorgBackup under BSD-3-Clause. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Bareos and BorgBackup with Docker?
Bareos: yes. BorgBackup: check the project docs for container support.