Tools
Milvus vs Qdrant
Milvus or Qdrant? Their plans monthly and yearly, the capabilities their makers state, security and latest updates, side by side — read from the makers' own pages.
In short
- Only Qdrant states: Command line, Self-hosted, API, Official SDKs, Runs models for you, Search over your data
Milvus
Open-source vector database for similarity search, hybrid retrieval, metadata filtering, and AI application data.
Plans
Milvus (Open Source)
Free
- 100% free open-source project under Apache License 2.0
- Self-hosted deployments (Lite, Standalone, Distributed)
- No usage limits from the software itself (hardware-dependent)
Prices checked 2026-09-25 by web search.
Latest updates
- milvus-3.0.2 (v3.0.2)
Milvus v3.0.2 improves filtered search, group-by, and index-building performance and adds external collection and Storage V2 support.
- milvus-2.6.24 (v2.6.24)
Milvus v2.6.24 reduces peak memory during segment loading and improves force-merge planning and filtered search.
- pkg/v3.0.2 (v3.0.2)
Snapshot restores targeting the same collection are now serialized.
Qdrant
Qdrant is an open-source vector search engine and managed cloud service for semantic search, RAG, recommendations, and AI agents.
Plans
Free Tier
Free
- Free forever
- Single Node Cluster
- 0.5 vCPU / 1GB RAM / 4 GB Disk
- Free Cloud Inference With Selected Models
Standard Tier
- from 25$
- Usage-based pricing
- Dedicated Resources
- Flexible Vertical and Horizontal Scaling
- Highly Available Setups
- Backup & Disaster Recovery
- 99.5% Uptime SLA
Prices checked 2026-09-25 on the maker’s page.
Capabilities
- Command line — “API, Terraform, Pulumi, CLI” source
- Self-hosted — “Open-source DNA with enterprise-grade security and flexibility — run on-prem, hybrid, edge, or move seamlessly to Qdrant Cloud.” source
- API — “Start with a single API call — scale to advanced control over HNSW, hybrid fusion, reranking, and multi-vector retrieval, all via REST, gRPC, or official clients (Python, JavaScript, etc.).” source
- Official SDKs — “official clients (Python, JavaScript, etc.).” source
- Runs models for you — “Generate text and image embeddings and run vector search in Qdrant Cloud — no separate pipeline or infrastructure needed.” source
- Search over your data — “Deliver context-rich answers with hybrid dense – sparse retrieval, metadata filters, and fresh updates.” source
Security
- SOC 2 Type II — “Qdrant holds SOC 2 Type 2 and HIPAA certifications.” source
- SOC 2 — “Qdrant holds SOC 2 Type 2 and HIPAA certifications.” source
- GDPR — “For deployments subject to GDPR, Qdrant provides a Data Processing Agreement covering data protection and privacy commitments.” source
- HIPAA — “Qdrant is HIPAA certified and Business Associate Agreement is available for Qdrant Managed Cloud.” source
- Data kept in the EU — “Data in Qdrant clusters stored only in the cluster's deployment region.” source
Latest updates
- v1.19.0 (v1.19.0)
Added 4-bit TurboQuant storage, per-component memory controls, keyword prefix filters, and per-query IDF for sparse search.
- v1.18.0 (v1.18.0)
- v1.17.0 (v1.17.0)
Added relevance feedback, optimization and telemetry APIs, update queue and controls, audit logging, weighted RRF, and upsert modes.