OpenAFS vs Tahoe-LAFS
OpenAFS
openafs.orgTahoe-LAFS
tahoe-lafs.orgSide by side
| Figure | OpenAFS | Tahoe-LAFS |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| API | — | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 1 |
| Spec score · Distributed File System Software | 7.7 (#15) | 8.3 (#6) |
| Founded | 2000 | 2007 |
| Intended users | The documentation describes AFS cells as suitable for organizations such as companies, university departments, or other defined groups of users. | The project describes a typical deployment where each user runs a gateway on their own machine and connects it to storage servers on other computers. |
| License | The project states that OpenAFS is distributed under the IBM Public License. | The project offers the software under GNU GPL version 2 or later, or the Transitive Grace Period Public Licence version 1.0 or later. |
| Platforms | The project home page lists UNIX, Linux, macOS, and Microsoft Windows among supported systems. | The installation guide lists Windows, macOS, Linux, and BSD as supported operating systems. |
| Support | The project wiki points users to mailing lists, an IRC channel, and a page listing individuals and companies offering support or consulting. | The installation guide directs users who need help with deployment to the tahoe-dev mailing list or Libera.Chat IRC. |
Plans
In their own words
OpenAFS
OpenAFS is a free, open-source implementation of the AFS distributed filesystem for accessing network files as though they were local. Location transparency lets users keep the same pathname when administrators move files between machines. AFS supports federated sharing and read-only replication across file servers, while the client Cache Manager keeps files in disk or memory cache to reduce repeated network requests. Kerberos authentication uses tokens for authenticated status, and directory access control lists define user and group permissions. Clients and servers mutually authenticate, with server processes encrypting particularly sensitive information sent to clients. However, commands in the fs, pts, and vos suites do not encrypt data before transmission. OpenAFS supports Linux, macOS, Windows, and self-hosted deployment, with AFS access plus NFS and SMB/CIFS options listed. The project lists version 1.8.16.1 as a June 2026 UNIX/Linux maintenance release and distributes it under the IBM Public License. Administrators assign each AFS volume a size limit or quota.
Tahoe-LAFS
Tahoe-LAFS is free, open-source software for storing files across multiple servers. Before upload, a client encrypts each file with a unique key. Erasure coding distributes each file as shares, allowing recovery when some storage servers fail; the documented default uses 10 shares across at least 7 servers and can recover from any 3. A gateway checks integrity and ignores corrupted shares. Files can be immutable or mutable, with read-only or read-write access for mutable files and directories. The gateway gives access through HTTP(S) and SFTP, and a REST-style Web API supports programmatic operations. Users can run a gateway or operate a full grid of storage nodes and an introducer. Installation is documented for Windows, macOS, Linux, and BSD. The software is available under GNU GPL version 2 or later, or the Transitive Grace Period Public Licence version 1.0 or later. It is free at free. The public test grid is for experimentation, not reliable or large-scale storage.