Blast vs RediSearch
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted search engines options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | Blast | RediSearch |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 14 · At risk | 90 · Excellent |
| Status | Archived | Actively maintained |
| Category | Search Engines | Search Engines |
| License | Apache-2.0 | RSALv2 |
| Language | Go | Rust |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 512 MB | 512 MB |
| Deployment | docker, binary, source | docker, kubernetes, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,073 | ★ 6,242 |
| First released | 2017 | 2017 |
| Replaces | Elasticsearch | Elasticsearch, Algolia |
What are Blast and RediSearch?
Blast
Blast is a full-text search and indexing server written in Go and built on the Bleve library, with support for clustering through the Raft consensus algorithm. It exposes both gRPC and HTTP APIs for indexing and searching documents.
- Distributed clustering
- Bleve-based indexing
- gRPC and HTTP APIs
- Raft consensus
RediSearch
RediSearch, part of the Redis Query Engine, adds full-text search, secondary indexing and vector search capabilities to Redis. It enables fast querying over data already stored in Redis.
- Full-text search inside Redis
- Secondary indexing of Redis data
- Vector similarity search
- Aggregations and queries
Blast vs RediSearch: key differences
The biggest difference is maintenance: Blast's repository is archived and no longer developed, while RediSearch is actively maintained. Blast is written in Go, while RediSearch is built with Rust. Licensing differs — Apache-2.0 for Blast versus RSALv2 for RediSearch. RediSearch has the considerably larger community, at 6,242 GitHub stars versus 1,073.
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
Choose RediSearch if…
- Very fast, in-memory
- Reuses existing Redis
Watch out for
- Source-available, not OSI licensed
Frequently asked questions
Is Blast or RediSearch better?
RediSearch is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler medium setup. Consider Blast if its specific feature set fits your needs better.
Are Blast and RediSearch free and open-source?
Yes. Blast is licensed under Apache-2.0 and RediSearch under RSALv2. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Blast and RediSearch with Docker?
Blast: yes. RediSearch: yes.