BorgBackup vs Sanoid
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?
BorgBackup
Deduplicating archiver with compression and encryption
VS
Sanoid
Policy-driven ZFS snapshot management and replication
| Feature | BorgBackup | Sanoid |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Backup & Recovery | Backup & Recovery |
| License | BSD-3-Clause | GPL-3.0 |
| Language | Python | Perl |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Hard |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | binary, bare-metal | bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 13,588 | ★ 3,830 |
| First released | 2015 | 2014 |
| Replaces | Carbonite, Backblaze | Time Machine |
Why pick each one
Choose Sanoid if…
- Released under the GPL-3.0 license
- Active community (3.8k GitHub stars)
- Written in Perl
- Tiny footprint — runs in 128 MB RAM
Frequently asked questions
Is BorgBackup or Sanoid better?
BorgBackup is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler medium setup. Consider Sanoid if its specific feature set fits your needs better.
Are BorgBackup and Sanoid free and open-source?
Yes. BorgBackup is licensed under BSD-3-Clause and Sanoid under GPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run BorgBackup and Sanoid with Docker?
BorgBackup: check the project docs for container support. Sanoid: check the project docs for container support.