SHSelfHostIndex

Sighthound Surveillance Station vs ZoneMinder

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted video surveillance options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

Not the right match-up?
SI Sighthound Surveillance Station NVR with object detection for connected IP cameras VS ZO ZoneMinder Full-featured closed-circuit television software suite
FeatureSighthound Surveillance StationZoneMinder
CategoryVideo SurveillanceVideo Surveillance
LicenseMITGPL-2.0
LanguagePythonPHP
Setup difficultyMediumHard
Min. RAM1,024 MB2,048 MB
Deploymentdockerdocker, bare-metal
GitHub stars★ 276★ 5,899
First released20202002
ReplacesNest CamBlue Iris, Milestone XProtect

Why pick each one

Choose Sighthound Surveillance Station if…

  • Released under the MIT license
  • First-class Docker support for quick deployment
  • Written in Python
Sighthound Surveillance Station details

Choose ZoneMinder if…

  • Very mature project
  • Highly configurable
ZoneMinder details

Frequently asked questions

Is Sighthound Surveillance Station or ZoneMinder better?

Neither is universally better. ZoneMinder has the larger community, while Sighthound Surveillance Station is simpler to set up (medium difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.

Are Sighthound Surveillance Station and ZoneMinder free and open-source?

Yes. Sighthound Surveillance Station is licensed under MIT and ZoneMinder under GPL-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Sighthound Surveillance Station and ZoneMinder with Docker?

Sighthound Surveillance Station: yes. ZoneMinder: yes.

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