go-crond vs Yacron
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted automation & workflows options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | go-crond | Yacron |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 5 · At risk | 54 · Fair |
| Category | Automation & Workflows | Automation & Workflows |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Language | Go | Python |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 32 MB | 64 MB |
| Deployment | docker, binary | docker, bare-metal, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 143 | ★ 474 |
| First released | 2017 | 2017 |
| Replaces | cron | cron |
What are go-crond and Yacron?
go-crond
go-crond is a small cron daemon written in Go that runs scheduled jobs from crontab-style files, designed for use inside containers and minimal environments. It is self-hosted as a single binary.
- Container-friendly cron
- Single static binary
- Crontab-compatible
- Run jobs as users
Yacron
Yacron is a modern replacement for the cron daemon configured entirely in YAML, with built-in reporting to email, Slack, and other channels when jobs fail. It handles overlapping runs and timezones gracefully.
- YAML job configuration
- Failure reporting channels
- Overlap protection
- Timezone aware
go-crond vs Yacron: key differences
Go-crond is written in Go, while Yacron is built with Python. Go-crond is the lighter option, starting around 32 MB of RAM against 64 MB for Yacron. Yacron has the considerably larger community, at 474 GitHub stars versus 143.
Why pick each one
Choose go-crond if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Written in Go
Choose Yacron if…
- Clear configuration
- Good alerting
Watch out for
- No web interface
- Single-host scope
Frequently asked questions
Is go-crond or Yacron better?
Neither is universally better. Yacron has the larger community; both share a easy setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are go-crond and Yacron free and open-source?
Yes. go-crond is licensed under MIT and Yacron under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run go-crond and Yacron with Docker?
go-crond: yes. Yacron: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, go-crond or Yacron?
go-crond has the smaller minimum footprint at 32 MB of RAM, compared to about 64 MB for Yacron. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.