Groonga vs Qdrant
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted search engines options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Groonga
Open-source full-text search engine and column store
VS
Qdrant
High-performance open-source vector search engine
| Feature | Groonga | Qdrant |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Search Engines | Search Engines |
| License | LGPL-2.1 | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | C | Rust |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 512 MB |
| Deployment | bare-metal, source | docker, kubernetes, helm |
| GitHub stars | ★ 854 | ★ 33,837 |
| First released | 2009 | 2021 |
| Replaces | Elasticsearch | Pinecone, Algolia |
Why pick each one
Frequently asked questions
Is Groonga or Qdrant better?
Neither is universally better. Qdrant has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Groonga and Qdrant free and open-source?
Yes. Groonga is licensed under LGPL-2.1 and Qdrant under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Groonga and Qdrant with Docker?
Groonga: check the project docs for container support. Qdrant: yes.