Milvus 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?
Milvus
Open-source vector database built for scalable similarity search
VS
Qdrant
High-performance open-source vector search engine
| Feature | Milvus | Qdrant |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Search Engines | Search Engines |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | Go | Rust |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 4,096 MB | 512 MB |
| Deployment | docker, kubernetes, helm | docker, kubernetes, helm |
| GitHub stars | ★ 45,556 | ★ 33,837 |
| First released | 2019 | 2021 |
| Replaces | Pinecone, Elasticsearch | Pinecone, Algolia |
Why pick each one
Frequently asked questions
Is Milvus or Qdrant better?
Neither is universally better. Milvus has the larger community, while Qdrant is simpler to set up (medium difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Milvus and Qdrant free and open-source?
Yes. Milvus is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Qdrant under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Milvus and Qdrant with Docker?
Milvus: yes. Qdrant: yes.