pgBackRest vs Sanoid
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted backup & recovery options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
pgBackRest
Reliable backup and restore solution for PostgreSQL
VS
Sanoid
Policy-driven ZFS snapshot management and replication
| Feature | pgBackRest | Sanoid |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Backup & Recovery | Backup & Recovery |
| License | MIT | GPL-3.0 |
| Language | C | Perl |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Hard |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | docker, binary | bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 4,296 | ★ 3,830 |
| First released | 2013 | 2014 |
| Replaces | Veeam | Time Machine |
Why pick each one
Choose pgBackRest if…
- Released under the MIT license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (4.3k GitHub stars)
- Written in C
Choose Sanoid if…
- Released under the GPL-3.0 license
- Active community (3.8k GitHub stars)
- Written in Perl
- Tiny footprint — runs in 128 MB RAM
Frequently asked questions
Is pgBackRest or Sanoid better?
Neither is universally better. pgBackRest has the larger community; both share a hard setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are pgBackRest and Sanoid free and open-source?
Yes. pgBackRest is licensed under MIT and Sanoid under GPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run pgBackRest and Sanoid with Docker?
pgBackRest: yes. Sanoid: check the project docs for container support.