Readers comparing database systems need to distinguish between tools built for analytics, application data, distributed SQL, search, and other workloads. This August 2026 snapshot uses ToolVitals scores and supplied project descriptions to make the leading options easier to compare.
The list includes only OSI-approved open-source tools. ToolVitals score is the primary ordering signal, followed by health and shipping for equal composite scores; GitHub stars are context only and do not determine the ranking.
Rankings
| Rank | Tool | Openness | License | Health | Shipping | GitHub Stars | Score | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ClickHouse | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 100 | 49385 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 2 | Convex | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 100 | 12411 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 3 | CrateDB | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 100 | 4424 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 4 | Dragonfly | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 100 | 31019 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 5 | DuckDB | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 100 | 100 | 40516 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 6 | LadybugDB | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 100 | 100 | 1628 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 7 | Manticore Search | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-3.0 | 100 | 100 | 11952 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 8 | Milvus | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 100 | 45728 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 9 | OpenSearch | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 100 | 13558 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 10 | ParadeDB | OSI-approved OSS | AGPL-3.0 | 100 | 100 | 9180 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 11 | Qdrant | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 100 | 34117 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 12 | RisingWave | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 100 | 9281 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 13 | S2 | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 100 | 100 | 620 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 14 | SeMI | OSI-approved OSS | BSD-3-Clause | 100 | 100 | 16745 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 15 | SpacetimeDB | OSI-approved OSS | AGPL-3.0 | 100 | 100 | 25039 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 16 | Spice.ai | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 100 | 3069 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 17 | Turso | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 100 | 100 | 23953 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 18 | Valkey | OSI-approved OSS | BSD-3-Clause | 100 | 100 | 26938 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 19 | Weaviate | OSI-approved OSS | BSD-3-Clause | 100 | 100 | 16745 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 20 | YDB | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 100 | 4768 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 21 | YTsaurus | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 100 | 2199 | 100 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 22 | StarRocks | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 99 | 98 | 12027 | 99 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 23 | etcd | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 99 | 98 | 52146 | 99 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 24 | Infinispan | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 100 | 96 | 1345 | 98 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 25 | DXOS | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 98 | 99 | 515 | 98 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 26 | Rayforce | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 98 | 99 | 262 | 98 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 27 | SereneDB | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 98 | 99 | 691 | 98 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 28 | XTDB | OSI-approved OSS | MPL-2.0 | 98 | 99 | 3044 | 98 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 29 | arcadedb | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 98 | 99 | 1096 | 98 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 30 | harper | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 98 | 99 | 85 | 98 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 31 | Electric SQL | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 98 | 96 | 10330 | 97 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 32 | MariaDB | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-2.0 | 98 | 96 | 8121 | 97 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 33 | QuestDB | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 98 | 96 | 17268 | 97 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 34 | TDengine | OSI-approved OSS | AGPL-3.0 | 98 | 96 | 25077 | 97 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 35 | TiDB | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 98 | 96 | 40457 | 97 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 36 | Trino | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 98 | 96 | 13167 | 97 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 37 | Xata | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 98 | 96 | 1049 | 97 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 38 | HelixDB | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 96 | 96 | 5824 | 96 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 39 | RxDB | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 95 | 98 | 23357 | 96 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 40 | Sonic | OSI-approved OSS | MPL-2.0 | 92 | 98 | 21315 | 94 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 41 | TerminusDB | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 93 | 93 | 3388 | 93 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 42 | PowerSync | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 95 | 87 | 711 | 92 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 43 | data-api-builder | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 94 | 88 | 1493 | 92 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 44 | PocketBase | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 87 | 93 | 60763 | 89 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 45 | PgLite | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 89 | 74 | 15894 | 83 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 46 | Neo4j | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-3.0 | 84 | 73 | 17103 | 80 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 47 | YantrikDB | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 80 | 80 | 171 | 80 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 48 | Apache AGE | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 81 | 61 | 4771 | 73 | 🟢 Good |
| 49 | Typesense | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-3.0 | 78 | 60 | 26468 | 71 | 🟢 Good |
| 50 | InfluxDB | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 74 | 52 | 31708 | 65 | 🟢 Good |
Top 3 Highlights
ClickHouse ranks first with a ToolVitals score of 100, a health score of 100, and a shipping score of 100. Its supplied description identifies it as a real-time analytics database management system, giving it a clear analytics focus. Its openness label is “OSI-approved OSS” and its license label is “Apache-2.0”.
Convex ranks second with a ToolVitals score of 100, a health score of 100, and a shipping score of 100. Its supplied description presents it as an open-source reactive database for app developers, distinguishing it from the analytics-first and distributed SQL positioning of the other top-ranked tools. Its openness label is “OSI-approved OSS” and its license label is “Apache-2.0”.
CrateDB ranks third with a ToolVitals score of 100, a health score of 100, and a shipping score of 100. Its supplied description emphasizes distributed and scalable SQL for massive amounts of data, near-real-time analysis, and complex queries, while also noting PostgreSQL compatibility and a Lucene foundation. Its openness label is “OSI-approved OSS” and its license label is “Apache-2.0”.
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