Apache RocketMQ vs AutoMQ
Apache RocketMQ
rocketmq.apache.org
AutoMQ
automq.comSide by side
| Figure | Apache RocketMQ | AutoMQ |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | $300/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | — |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | Yes | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | — |
| macOS | Yes | — |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 2 | 2 |
| Spec score · Event Streaming Platforms | 8.9 (#2) | 8.4 (#3) |
| Deployment | RocketMQ 5.x separates stateless Proxy from storage and compute so those layers can scale independently. | AutoMQ Software can be deployed on premises, in private or public clouds, using a binary, Helm, or Docker Compose. |
| Security | RocketMQ provides ACL and TLS, but operators must configure ACL or restrict access to trusted networks; the security guide warns that ACL is not enabled by default. | The security page describes TLS or mTLS for Kafka client connections, optional encryption at rest for AWS BYOC, and RBAC for AutoMQ Cloud control-plane operations. |
| What it does | Apache RocketMQ is a distributed messaging and streaming platform designed for low latency, high throughput, reliability and very large scale. | AutoMQ is Kafka-compatible streaming software that runs Kafka on cloud object storage. |
Plans
Apache RocketMQ
- Apache RocketMQFree
- Apache RocketMQ open-source distributionFree
In their own words
Apache RocketMQ
Apache RocketMQ is distributed middleware for asynchronous communication and publish/subscribe messaging. Its asynchronous model can separate systems and shift loads between upstream and downstream services. Messaging options include publish/subscribe, request/reply, streaming, transactional messages, FIFO ordering, filtering, and push or pull consumption. The project lists durable persistence, replication, failover, fault tolerance, high-availability options, and cross-region disaster recovery. Its site describes million-level LiteTopics per cluster and says RocketMQ has demonstrated 10M+ TPS throughput. It can run locally, in Docker, or Kubernetes, with source and binary packages available. The ecosystem includes EventBridge, MQTT, RocketMQ Connect, RocketMQ Streams, Spring, Flink, Prometheus Exporter, and a Kubernetes Operator; AI options include native MCP support, A2A compatibility, and integrations with LangChain, CrewAI, AutoGen, AgentScope, Dify, and Coze. The project lists gRPC SDKs for Java, Go, Python, C++, and Rust, plus gRPC, MQTT, JMS, and OpenMessaging protocols. It is free under Apache License 2.0. ACL is not enabled by default.
AutoMQ
AutoMQ is Kafka-compatible streaming software that runs Kafka on cloud object storage. It supports S3, Google Cloud Storage, Azure Blob Storage, MinIO, and Ceph, and can be deployed on premises or in private and public clouds by binary, Helm, or Docker Compose. AutoMQ states sub-10ms P99 latency and automatic scaling with traffic, including partition rebalancing across brokers. Table Topic can materialize Kafka topics as Iceberg or Delta Lake tables without ETL pipelines, for direct querying with Spark, Trino, or Flink. Managed Connector runs Kafka Connect workers in a customer’s Kubernetes environment, with logs and monitoring for throughput, task health, failures, and anomalies. The platform lists stream processing, schema registry, exactly-once delivery, a maximum 90-day retention period, and 300 connectors. Supported client languages include Java, C/C++, Go, Python, and NodeJS. Pro costs $300 a month; Enterprise pricing is by contact. There is no free plan, but a 30-day free trial requires no credit card.