go2rtc vs zmNinja

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?
Featurego2rtczmNinja
CategoryVideo SurveillanceVideo Surveillance
LicenseMITGPL-2.0
LanguageGoJavaScript
Setup difficultyMediumEasy
Min. RAM128 MB256 MB
Deploymentdocker, binary, bare-metalbinary, source
GitHub stars★ 13,837★ 1,080
First released20222015
ReplacesNest CamCommercial CCTV apps

Why pick each one

Choose go2rtc if…

  • Very low latency
  • Lightweight and flexible
go2rtc details

Choose zmNinja if…

  • Polished ZoneMinder client
  • Works on all platforms
zmNinja details

Frequently asked questions

Is go2rtc or zmNinja better?

Neither is universally better. go2rtc has the larger community, while zmNinja is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.

Are go2rtc and zmNinja free and open-source?

Yes. go2rtc is licensed under MIT and zmNinja under GPL-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run go2rtc and zmNinja with Docker?

go2rtc: yes. zmNinja: check the project docs for container support.

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