What is restic used for?

Restic is a cross-platform command-line backup program that stores deduplicated, encrypted snapshots in local or cloud storage backends. It is a good fit for automated server and workstation backups, and off-site backups to inexpensive object storage.

Is restic open source?

Yes. restic is open source under the BSD-2-Clause licence. Its source code is on GitHub at restic/restic and is written mainly in Go.

Yes. restic is open source, so the software itself is free to use.

What is restic an alternative to?

restic is an open-source alternative to CrashPlan, Backblaze Computer Backup, Veeam and Degoo. Other open-source alternatives to CrashPlan include BorgBackup, Kopia and Duplicati.

Is restic actively maintained?

Yes. The most recent commit to restic was on 1 October 2026, and the latest release is v0.19.1, published on 5 July 2026. The project has 36k stars on GitHub.

restic: open-source alternative to CrashPlan

About restic

Restic is a backup program designed to be fast, efficient and secure. It runs on Linux, macOS and Windows, with support for FreeBSD and OpenBSD, and ships as a single command-line tool written in Go. It is released under the BSD-2-Clause license, and the project keeps documentation and a Discourse forum for questions.

Backups are stored in a repository that you create with an init command and protect with a password, and the README warns that losing the password means losing the data. Each run saves a snapshot, and deduplication keeps repeated data from using extra space. Files can be restored with a restore command, or the repository can be mounted through FUSE so past snapshots can be browsed. Restic can store backups in a local directory, over SFTP, on an HTTP REST server, in Amazon S3 or S3-compatible storage, OpenStack Swift, Backblaze B2, Azure Blob Storage, Google Cloud Storage, or through rclone.

Key features

Encrypted, deduplicated backup snapshots
Backends for S3, B2, Azure, GCS and SFTP
Any rclone remote supported as a backend
Restore command and FUSE mount for browsing
Runs on Linux, macOS, Windows and BSD
Single Go binary with password-protected repositories

Good fit for

→Automated server and workstation backups
→Off-site backups to inexpensive object storage

Built with: Go
Tags: backup; deduplication; encryption; command-line; golang; s3; snapshots; restore

restic: questions and answers

What is restic used for?: Restic is a cross-platform command-line backup program that stores deduplicated, encrypted snapshots in local or cloud storage backends. It is a good fit for automated server and workstation backups, and off-site backups to inexpensive object storage.
Is restic open source?: Yes. restic is open source under the BSD-2-Clause licence. Its source code is on GitHub at restic/restic and is written mainly in Go.
Is restic free?: Yes. restic is open source, so the software itself is free to use.
What is restic an alternative to?: restic is an open-source alternative to CrashPlan, Backblaze Computer Backup, Veeam and Degoo. Other open-source alternatives to CrashPlan include BorgBackup, Kopia and Duplicati.
Is restic actively maintained?: Yes. The most recent commit to restic was on 1 October 2026, and the latest release is v0.19.1, published on 5 July 2026. The project has 36k stars on GitHub.