Garage is a free, open-source S3-compatible object storage system for small, geo-distributed self-hosted clusters. See features and alternatives.
Category
Cloud Storage
Pricing
Open Source, from Free
Verified
Not yet
Last updated
July 18, 2026
Founded
2020
Headquarters
Distributed (Deuxfleurs association members based in Rennes, Paris, Lille and Brussels; registered address in Lille, France)
APIOpen SourceSelf-Hosted
Overview
Garage is a free, open-source, S3-compatible object storage system built by the Deuxfleurs association and released for production use starting in 2020, purpose-built for small, geographically distributed self-hosted clusters.
Unlike storage systems designed for a single data center, Garage uses Dynamo-style consistent hashing and CRDTs so nodes can handle requests independently even under high inter-node latency, avoiding the consensus bottlenecks of Raft-based systems.
Key Features
Garage implements the core Amazon S3 REST API, including multipart uploads, presigned URLs, bucket policies, CORS and versioning, making it a drop-in backend for tools like Nextcloud, Matrix, Mastodon and PeerTube.
It ships as a single dependency-free Rust binary that runs on as little as 1GB of RAM and supports heterogeneous or secondhand x86_64, ARMv7 and ARMv8 hardware.
Pricing
Garage is free and open source under the AGPLv3 license, with no company, subscription or licensing fee behind it; anyone can run it at zero cost beyond their own hardware.
Development has instead been funded through European public research programs such as NGI POINTER and NLnet's NGI0 Entrust and Commons Fund initiatives.
Key Features
Amazon S3 API compatibility — Supports multipart uploads, presigned URLs, bucket policies, CORS and versioning for drop-in compatibility with S3 tooling.
Dynamo-style consistent hashing — Distributes data across nodes using a hashing ring inspired by Amazon's Dynamo system.
CRDT-based consistency — Reconciles state between nodes without a consensus protocol, avoiding bottlenecks under high latency.
Geo-distributed replication — Designed to replicate data across nodes in different physical locations and stay available if some are unreachable.
Single dependency-free binary — Ships as one static Rust binary with no external database or orchestration required.
Low hardware requirements — Runs on as little as 1GB RAM and 16GB disk, supporting older or secondhand machines.
Broad ecosystem compatibility — Works with Nextcloud, Matrix, Mastodon, PeerTube, rclone, restic and other S3-compatible tools.
High failure resilience — Built to tolerate node, disk and network failures without losing availability.
Pros & Cons
Pros
Free and open source under AGPLv3 with no vendor lock-in
Genuinely lightweight; runs on secondhand or low-power hardware
Purpose-built for geo-distributed, non-datacenter deployments
Avoids consensus bottlenecks through a CRDT-based design
Backed by public research funding rather than venture capital, aligning incentives with users
Cons
Not a fully managed service; requires self-hosting and cluster administration
Smaller ecosystem and less commercial support than AWS S3, MinIO or Backblaze B2
Best suited to small-to-medium scale rather than hyperscale storage needs
AGPLv3 licensing can be a blocker for some commercial redistribution use cases
Pricing
Self-Hosted (Open Source) Free N/A
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Garage really S3-compatible?
Yes, it implements the core Amazon S3 REST API including multipart uploads, presigned URLs, CORS and bucket policies, so most existing S3 clients work unmodified.
Who builds and maintains Garage?
The Deuxfleurs association, a French collective of self-hosting enthusiasts and researchers, originally founded by PhD students including Alex Auvolat and Quentin Dufour.
How is Garage funded?
Through European public research funding programs including NGI POINTER, NLnet's NGI0 Entrust, and the NGI0 Commons Fund, between 2021 and 2025.
What hardware does Garage need?
As little as 1GB RAM and 16GB disk per node, running on x86_64, ARMv7 or ARMv8 CPUs, including older or secondhand machines.
What applications work with Garage?
Nextcloud, Matrix, Mastodon, PeerTube, rclone and any other S3-API-compatible software.
How does Garage differ from MinIO?
Garage is purpose-built for small, geographically distributed clusters with high network latency tolerance and CRDT-based consistency, while MinIO focuses more on high-performance, low-latency data center deployments.