Barman vs Rclone

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?
FeatureBarmanRclone
CategoryBackup & RecoveryBackup & Recovery
LicenseGPL-3.0MIT
LanguagePythonGo
Setup difficultyHardMedium
Min. RAM256 MB128 MB
Deploymentbare-metalbinary, docker
GitHub stars★ 3,214★ 58,995
First released20122014
ReplacesVeeamBackblaze

Why pick each one

Choose Barman if…

  • Released under the GPL-3.0 license
  • Active community (3.2k GitHub stars)
  • Written in Python
  • Tiny footprint — runs in 256 MB RAM
Barman details

Choose Rclone if…

  • Works with almost any cloud
  • Extremely versatile
  • Reliable
Rclone details

Frequently asked questions

Is Barman or Rclone better?

Rclone is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler medium setup. Consider Barman if its specific feature set fits your needs better.

Are Barman and Rclone free and open-source?

Yes. Barman is licensed under GPL-3.0 and Rclone under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Barman and Rclone with Docker?

Barman: check the project docs for container support. Rclone: yes.

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