Drift vs pasty
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted pastebins & snippets options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Drift
Self-hostable Gist alternative with a clean editor
VS
pasty
Fast and lightweight code-pasting server
| Feature | Drift | pasty |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Pastebins & Snippets | Pastebins & Snippets |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Language | TypeScript | Go |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 512 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | docker, bare-metal | docker, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,363 | ★ 222 |
| First released | 2022 | 2020 |
| Replaces | GitHub Gist | Pastebin.com |
Why pick each one
Choose Drift if…
- Released under the AGPL-3.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (1.4k GitHub stars)
- Written in TypeScript
Choose pasty if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Written in Go
Frequently asked questions
Is Drift or pasty better?
Neither is universally better. Drift has the larger community, while pasty is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Drift and pasty free and open-source?
Yes. Drift is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and pasty under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Drift and pasty with Docker?
Drift: yes. pasty: yes.