Duplicati vs Restic Cron
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted backup & recovery options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Duplicati
Free backup software with a friendly web UI
VS
Restic Cron
Containerized scheduled restic backup runner
| Feature | Duplicati | Restic Cron |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 95 · Excellent | 70 · Good |
| Category | Backup & Recovery | Backup & Recovery |
| License | MIT | BSD-2-Clause |
| Language | C# | Shell |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 64 MB |
| Deployment | docker, bare-metal | docker |
| GitHub stars | ★ 15,020 | ★ 715 |
| First released | 2008 | 2019 |
| Replaces | Backblaze, Carbonite | Backblaze |
What are Duplicati and Restic Cron?
Duplicati
Duplicati is free backup software that stores encrypted, incremental backups to cloud and local destinations through a web interface. It targets users who want scheduled GUI-driven backups. It is deployed via Docker or installers.
- Web-based backup management
- Encrypted incremental backups
- Many cloud storage targets
- Scheduling built in
Restic Cron
A containerized scheduler that runs restic backups on a cron schedule and prunes old snapshots. It is designed to be a drop-in backup sidecar for self-hosted stacks.
- Cron-scheduled backups
- Automatic pruning
- restic backend
- Sidecar container
Duplicati vs Restic Cron: key differences
Duplicati is written in C#, while Restic Cron is built with Shell. Licensing differs — MIT for Duplicati versus BSD-2-Clause for Restic Cron. Restic Cron is the lighter option, starting around 64 MB of RAM against 256 MB for Duplicati. Duplicati is the more established project (first released 2008), while Restic Cron arrived in 2019. Duplicati has the considerably larger community, at 15,020 GitHub stars versus 715.
Why pick each one
Choose Duplicati if…
- Friendly GUI
- Broad storage support
- Free
Watch out for
- Restores can be slow
- Long beta history
Choose Restic Cron if…
- Released under the BSD-2-Clause license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Written in Shell
Frequently asked questions
Is Duplicati or Restic Cron better?
Neither is universally better. Duplicati has the larger community; both share a easy setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Duplicati and Restic Cron free and open-source?
Yes. Duplicati is licensed under MIT and Restic Cron under BSD-2-Clause. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Duplicati and Restic Cron with Docker?
Duplicati: yes. Restic Cron: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Duplicati or Restic Cron?
Restic Cron has the smaller minimum footprint at 64 MB of RAM, compared to about 256 MB for Duplicati. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.