borgmatic vs Restic Mailer
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted backup & recovery options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
borgmatic
Simple configuration-driven frontend for BorgBackup
VS
Restic Mailer
Notification wrapper for restic backup jobs
| Feature | borgmatic | Restic Mailer |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Category | Backup & Recovery | Backup & Recovery |
| License | GPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Language | Python | Shell |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 128 MB | 64 MB |
| Deployment | docker, binary | docker, bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 2,000 | ★ 663 |
| First released | 2013 | 2018 |
| Replaces | CrashPlan, Backblaze | Backblaze |
What are borgmatic and Restic Mailer?
borgmatic
borgmatic is a command-line tool that wraps BorgBackup to make it easy to schedule and configure backups. It adds features like database dumps, monitoring hooks, and consistency checks.
- Declarative YAML configuration
- Database backup integration
- Monitoring service hooks
Restic Mailer
A wrapper around restic that runs backups on schedule and emails detailed success or failure reports. It adds visibility to unattended restic deployments.
- Scheduled restic runs
- Email job reports
- systemd integration
- Unattended backups
borgmatic vs Restic Mailer: key differences
Borgmatic is written in Python, while Restic Mailer is built with Shell. Licensing differs — GPL-3.0 for borgmatic versus MIT for Restic Mailer. Restic Mailer is the lighter option, starting around 64 MB of RAM against 128 MB for borgmatic. Borgmatic is the more established project (first released 2013), while Restic Mailer arrived in 2018. Borgmatic has the considerably larger community, at 2,000 GitHub stars versus 663.
Why pick each one
Choose borgmatic if…
- Released under the GPL-3.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (2k GitHub stars)
- Written in Python
Choose Restic Mailer if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Written in Shell
Frequently asked questions
Is borgmatic or Restic Mailer better?
Neither is universally better. borgmatic has the larger community, while Restic Mailer is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are borgmatic and Restic Mailer free and open-source?
Yes. borgmatic is licensed under GPL-3.0 and Restic Mailer under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run borgmatic and Restic Mailer with Docker?
borgmatic: yes. Restic Mailer: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, borgmatic or Restic Mailer?
Restic Mailer has the smaller minimum footprint at 64 MB of RAM, compared to about 128 MB for borgmatic. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.