Stract vs Vane
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted search engines options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | Stract | Vane |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | ≈5-minute setup |
| Health score | 15 · At risk | 96 · Excellent |
| Status | Archived | Actively maintained |
| Category | Search Engines | Search Engines |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Language | Rust | TypeScript |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 4,096 MB | 1,024 MB |
| Deployment | docker, binary, source | docker, bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 2,371 | ★ 36,903 |
| First released | 2023 | 2024 |
| Replaces | Google Search, Bing | Google Search |
What are Stract and Vane?
Stract
Stract is an open-source web search engine built from scratch in Rust. It includes its own crawler and index and aims to give users more transparency and control over ranking.
- Independent web crawler and index
- Customizable ranking signals
- Optic-based result filtering
- Modern Rust implementation
Vane
Perplexica is an open-source AI-powered answer engine that searches the web and uses language models to provide sourced answers. It can run fully self-hosted alongside SearXNG and local LLMs.
- AI answers with cited sources
- Works with local LLMs
- Multiple focus modes
- Uses SearXNG as a backend
Stract vs Vane: key differences
The biggest difference is maintenance: Stract's repository is archived and no longer developed, while Vane is actively maintained. Stract is written in Rust, while Vane is built with TypeScript. Licensing differs — AGPL-3.0 for Stract versus MIT for Vane. Vane is the lighter option, starting around 1,024 MB of RAM against 4,096 MB for Stract. Vane has the considerably larger community, at 36,903 GitHub stars versus 2,371.
Why pick each one
Choose Stract if…
- Transparent ranking
- Independent index
Watch out for
- Large hardware requirements for full crawl
Choose Vane if…
- Self-hosted AI search
- Simple Docker deployment
- Free and open source
Watch out for
- LLM backend required
- Young project
Frequently asked questions
Is Stract or Vane better?
Vane is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler medium setup. Consider Stract if its specific feature set fits your needs better.
Are Stract and Vane free and open-source?
Yes. Stract is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and Vane under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Stract and Vane with Docker?
Stract: yes. Vane: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Stract or Vane?
Vane has the smaller minimum footprint at 1,024 MB of RAM, compared to about 4,096 MB for Stract. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.