Cloud Parts

PGSTY Silo

A community-maintained fork of the open-source MinIO server, with builds, images, security fixes and the full web console.

What it is
Object storage
Type
Open source
Made by
Pigsty community (PGSTY)
License
AGPLv3
Facts checked
5 October 2026
Website Source code

What it is

Silo is the open-source MinIO server, kept alive. When MinIO, Inc. stopped shipping community binaries and archived the minio/minio repository, the Pigsty project, which uses MinIO to store PostgreSQL backups, forked it and kept one release line going: prebuilt binaries, multi-arch container images, RPM, DEB and APK packages, security fixes, and the web admin console that upstream had removed from the community build.

It is meant as a drop-in replacement. The S3 API, the MINIO_* environment variables, metrics, routes and the on-disk format are unchanged, so the same disks can move from MinIO to Silo without copying data or rewriting metadata. What changes is the packaging: the server binary is called silo, images live at docker.io/pgsty/silo, and the default config directory is ~/.silo. The image still accepts minio server /data as a command, and it ships the mc client.

Why teams pick it

  • The closest replacement for MinIO: same S3 API, same MINIO_* settings, same data on disk
  • Prebuilt binaries, packages and images again, including on Docker Hub
  • Restores the full web console (users, policies, buckets, metrics) that the community build lost
  • AGPLv3 with no CLA: contributions stay with their authors, so no single company can relicense it

Watch out for

  • Young and maintained by a small community, so check its release cadence and security advisories yourself
  • No mixed MinIO and Silo cluster: upgrade every node to Silo in one go, not as a rolling upgrade
  • Scripts that call /usr/bin/minio or use the minio/minio image name need updating
  • Inherits MinIO’s AGPLv3 obligations if you modify it and offer it over a network

Alternatives

What all object storage have in common →
Amazon S3AWSAWS’s object storage, and the de facto API most object stores copy.Apache OpenDALOpen sourceA Rust library, with bindings for Python, Java, Node.js, Go and more, that gives one API (read, write, stat, list, delete) over 50-plus storage backends: S3 and other object stores, local and HDFS file systems, Google Drive and Dropbox, and key-value stores.Apache OzoneOpen sourceA Hadoop-born object store that serves the same buckets over S3 and as a Hadoop file system.Azure Blob StorageAzureAzure’s object storage, with three blob types and an optional real directory tree for analytics.Backblaze B2 Cloud StorageCommercialLow-cost object storage on Backblaze’s own hardware, with its own API and an S3-compatible one.CephOpen sourceA distributed storage cluster that serves S3 buckets, block devices and a file system from the same pool of disks.Cloudflare R2CommercialS3-compatible object storage from Cloudflare that charges nothing for data going out.GarageOpen sourceA lightweight S3 object store that keeps copies of your data in several sites linked by ordinary Internet connections.Google Cloud StorageGoogle CloudGoogle Cloud’s object storage, where even the archive class answers in milliseconds.MinIOArchivedOpen sourceA self-hosted object store that speaks the S3 API. The open-source edition is archived and its images are gone from Docker Hub; MinIO now sells AIStor.RustFSOpen sourceA young Rust reimplementation of MinIO’s design: S3-compatible, erasure-coded, Apache 2.0, and generally available since September 2026.SeaweedFSOpen sourceA distributed blob store with an S3 gateway and a file system layer, built to store and serve billions of small files.TigrisCommercialGlobally distributed S3-compatible object storage that moves data to where it’s read, with no egress fees.Versity S3 GatewayOpen sourceA stateless S3 server that exposes an existing file system, or another object store, through the S3 API.Wasabi Hot Cloud StorageCommercialS3-compatible object storage sold at one flat price per TB, with no egress or request fees.Zenko CloudServerOpen sourceScality’s open-source Node.js S3 server: a light S3 endpoint for development and tests, and a front end that can store objects in other clouds.

How it fits with other technologies

Run Silo where you used to run MinIO · bash

docker run -d --name silo --restart unless-stopped \
  -p 9000:9000 -p 9001:9001 \
  -v /data/silo:/data \
  -e MINIO_ROOT_USER=silo-admin \
  -e MINIO_ROOT_PASSWORD="$SILO_ROOT_PASSWORD" \
  docker.io/pgsty/silo:RELEASE.2026-09-16T00-00-00Z server /data --console-address :9001

# the same S3 clients work; the console is on port 9001
aws s3 mb s3://backups --endpoint-url http://localhost:9000
aws s3 cp ./db.dump s3://backups/ --endpoint-url http://localhost:9000

What changes when you move from MinIO#

MinIO community editionSilo
Data on diskMinIO formatSame format; no copy or metadata rewrite
SettingsMINIO_* variables, ~/.minioSame MINIO_* variables; config in ~/.silo, with a fallback to the old location
Server binaryminiosilo (no /usr/bin/minio alias)
Container imageminio/minio, no longer on Docker Hubdocker.io/pgsty/silo; minio server still works as the command
Web consoleObject browser only since 2025Full admin console

See it in a real stack

No architecture uses PGSTY Silo yet. Drop it into the playground and wire it up yourself.Open playground →
Where it came from2025–2026

Pigsty, an open-source PostgreSQL distribution, had used MinIO as the place to keep database backups. Through 2025 MinIO, Inc. pulled back from the community edition: the admin console was cut down to an object browser, then in October 2025 the project switched to source-only releases with no prebuilt binaries, and in December it went into maintenance mode. Pigsty’s maintainers forked the server and published their first build in December 2025.

The fork’s stated motive is practical rather than ideological. Its manifesto says that if upstream restores its community edition, the fork will narrow its scope and offer its fixes back. Until then it keeps one maintained line of the AGPLv3 server: builds, packages, images, security fixes and the full console.

Upstream archived minio/minio in April 2026. In August 2026 the fork renamed itself from pgsty/minio to Silo, renaming the product and its binaries and images but, in its own words, not “the protocol and your data”.

Why it’s built this way

Keep the protocol, data and settings; rename the product
Users needed to keep their disks and configuration, but a fork can’t use MinIO’s trademarks. So the S3 API, MINIO_* variables and on-disk format stay, while the binary, image and console are renamed.
No CLA, only DCO sign-off
Without copyright assignment no single entity owns all of the code, so the AGPLv3 can’t be changed later. MinIO, Inc., which did hold the copyright, had already relicensed the server once, from Apache 2.0 to AGPLv3 in 2021.
Restore the full web console
In 2025 the community build lost its admin console, leaving an object browser and the mc command line. Users complained, and the fork put the full console back.

Timeline

  1. 2025

    Admin console removed from MinIO’s community build

  2. 2025

    MinIO goes source-only (October); Pigsty forks the server

  3. 2025

    First fork release, RELEASE.2025-12-03T12-00-00Z, published in December

  4. 2026

    Upstream minio/minio archived on 25 April

  5. 2026

    Fork renamed from pgsty/minio to Silo on 6 August

Sources6 · facts checked 5 October 2026

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