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Indie alternatives to Celery

3 products made by independent developers and small teams that do what Celery does, 3 of them with a free plan. Free and open-source options come first.

At a glance

Product	Price	Open source	Self-host	Platforms
BullMQ	Free plan	–	Yes	Self-hosted
Hatchet	Free plan	Yes	Yes	Web, Self-hosted
Temporal	Free plan	Yes	Yes	Self-hosted, Web

The alternatives

1. BullMQ

Redis-based message queue and job scheduler for Node.js

BullMQ is an open-source library for background jobs and message queues in Node.js and Python, backed by Redis, with commercial Pro add-ons.

Free plan · Self-hosted · Website ↗

2. Hatchet

Background task orchestration on Postgres

Hatchet is an open-source platform for distributed task queues and durable workflows built on Postgres.

Free plan · Web, Self-hosted · Website ↗

3. Temporal

Open-source durable execution platform

Temporal runs long-lived workflows as code with automatic retries and state persistence across failures.

Free plan · Self-hosted, Web · Website ↗

Questions

Is there a free alternative to Celery?

Yes. 3 of the 3 indie alternatives listed here have a free plan or are free: BullMQ, Hatchet and Temporal.

Is there an open-source alternative to Celery?

Hatchet and Temporal are open source.

Can I self-host an alternative to Celery?

Yes: BullMQ, Hatchet and Temporal can run on your own server.

What makes these alternatives to Celery “indie”?

They are built by independent developers or small teams rather than large companies. Each one is listed because it does the same core job as Celery.

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