Blast vs Elasticsearch
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted search engines options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Blast
Distributed full-text search server in Go
VS
Elasticsearch
Distributed search and analytics engine
| Feature | Blast | Elasticsearch |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Search Engines | Search Engines |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Elastic-2.0 |
| Language | Go | Java |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Hard |
| Min. RAM | 512 MB | 2,048 MB |
| Deployment | docker, binary, source | docker, kubernetes, bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,074 | ★ 77,808 |
| First released | 2017 | 2010 |
| Replaces | Elasticsearch | Algolia, Splunk |
Why pick each one
Choose Blast if…
- Released under the Apache-2.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (1.1k GitHub stars)
- Written in Go
Frequently asked questions
Is Blast or Elasticsearch better?
Neither is universally better. Elasticsearch has the larger community; both share a hard setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Blast and Elasticsearch free and open-source?
Yes. Blast is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Elasticsearch under Elastic-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Blast and Elasticsearch with Docker?
Blast: yes. Elasticsearch: yes.