Supercronic 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 | Supercronic | Yacron |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 86 · Excellent | 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 | ★ 2,651 | ★ 474 |
| First released | 2017 | 2017 |
| Replaces | cron | cron |
What are Supercronic and Yacron?
Supercronic
Supercronic is an open-source cron job runner that is crontab compatible and designed specifically to run inside containers. It is self-hosted to schedule periodic tasks with proper logging and signal handling.
- Crontab compatible
- Container friendly
- Proper logging
- Lightweight single binary
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
Supercronic vs Yacron: key differences
Supercronic is written in Go, while Yacron is built with Python. Supercronic is the lighter option, starting around 32 MB of RAM against 64 MB for Yacron. Supercronic has the considerably larger community, at 2,651 GitHub stars versus 474.
Why pick each one
Choose Supercronic if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Active community (2.7k GitHub stars)
Choose Yacron if…
- Clear configuration
- Good alerting
Watch out for
- No web interface
- Single-host scope
Frequently asked questions
Is Supercronic or Yacron better?
Neither is universally better. Supercronic has the larger community; both share a easy setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Supercronic and Yacron free and open-source?
Yes. Supercronic is licensed under MIT and Yacron under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Supercronic and Yacron with Docker?
Supercronic: yes. Yacron: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Supercronic or Yacron?
Supercronic 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.