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Quickwit vs Tantivy

Quickwit: Cloud-native search engine on object storage for logs and traces, built on Tantivy. Tantivy: Lucene-inspired full-text search library in Rust, the engine under Quickwit and ParadeDB.

key differences

  • Quickwit is built for larger datasets (Multi-PB) than Tantivy (≤ 10 TB).
  • Horizontal scaling is native in Quickwit and manual in Tantivy.
  • Transactions: Quickwit offers none ACID; Tantivy offers limited.
  • Only Quickwit has ttl / expiry, streaming ingest.
  • Tantivy can run embedded in your application process.

choose quickwit for

  • +Log search and retention at large scale
  • +Distributed tracing backend
  • +Security and audit event search
  • +Cheap replacement for Elasticsearch hot-warm logging clusters

best at · Observability, Search, Time-series

choose tantivy for

  • +Embedding full-text search in Rust applications
  • +Building custom search services
  • +Search inside other databases (e.g., Postgres extensions)

best at · Search, Embedded

QuickwitCloud-native search engine on object storage for logs and traces, built on Tantivy.
TantivyLucene-inspired full-text search library in Rust, the engine under Quickwit and ParadeDB.
overview
Primary model
Search Engine
Search Engine
Also supports
Document, Time-Series
–
Type
Database engine
Embedded library
Status
Active
Active
Developer
Quickwit (Datadog)
Quickwit (Datadog) and contributors
First release
2021
2016
Latest version
0.9.3 (Oct 22, 2026)
0.27.0 (Oct 17, 2026)
License
Open source (permissive)Apache License 2.0
Open source (permissive)MIT License
Free tier
✓
✓
popularity
WhichDB Score
11.9
22.6
Rank
#275
#135
GitHub stars
11.7K
16.3K
Stack Overflow questions
–
–
scale & guarantees
Comfortable data size
Massive (Multi-PB)
Medium (≤ 10 TB)
Horizontal scaling
Native
Manual
Multi-region
None
None
ACID
None
Limited
Consistency
Eventual
Strong
Schema
Flexible
Strict
Architecture
Distributed, Shared storage
Embedded
deployment
Self-hosted
✓
✓
Vendor-managed cloud
—
—
Serverless
—
—
Embedded
—
✓
Edge
—
—
Clouds
–
–
capabilities
Transactions
—
—
Joins
—
—
Secondary indexes
—
—
Full-text search
✓
✓
Vector search
—
—
Geospatial
—
—
JSON
✓
✓
Change data capture
—
—
Triggers
—
—
Stored procedures
—
—
Materialized views
—
—
TTL / expiry
✓
—
Pub/Sub
—
—
Columnar storage
✓
✓
In-memory
—
—
Durable persistence
✓
✓
Compression
✓
✓
Encryption at rest
—
—
Role-based access
—
—
Time travel
—
—
Branching
—
—
Online schema changes
—
—
Streaming ingest
✓
—
Offline sync
—
—
Runs in WebAssembly
—
—
interfaces
Query languages
Quickwit query language, Elasticsearch Query DSL (subset)
Tantivy query parser (Lucene-like), Rust API
Client languages
Any HTTP client
Rust, Python
Best for
Observability, Search, Time-series
Search, Embedded
Add more to this comparisonNot sure either fits? Try smart match

Quickwit vs Tantivy: FAQ

What is the difference between Quickwit and Tantivy?

Quickwit: Cloud-native search engine on object storage for logs and traces, built on Tantivy. Tantivy: Lucene-inspired full-text search library in Rust, the engine under Quickwit and ParadeDB. Quickwit is built for larger datasets (Multi-PB) than Tantivy (≤ 10 TB). Horizontal scaling is native in Quickwit and manual in Tantivy. Transactions: Quickwit offers none ACID; Tantivy offers limited.

When should I choose Quickwit over Tantivy?

Choose Quickwit for log search and retention at large scale; distributed tracing backend; and security and audit event search. Choose Tantivy for embedding full-text search in Rust applications; building custom search services; and search inside other databases (e.g., Postgres extensions).

Is Quickwit or Tantivy more popular?

Tantivy ranks #135 on the WhichDB Score (22.6/100) and Quickwit ranks #275 (11.9/100). Popularity is not fit: check the requirements that matter for your project.

Are Quickwit and Tantivy open source?

Yes. Quickwit is open source. License: Apache License 2.0. Yes. Tantivy is open source. License: MIT License.