# harvester/harvester

Open source hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) software

Repository: https://github.com/harvester/harvester
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/harvester
Homepage: https://harvesterhci.io/
Language: Go
License: Apache-2.0
License Family: permissive
Topics: harvester, kubernetes, virtualization
Last push: 2026-08-26T13:05:56+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 94/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-02T17:46:02.011165+00:00)
- activity 99, release rhythm 84, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 2241, "days_push": 7, "days_rel": 26, "gap_med": 45.0, "n_releases_24m": 17}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 5140, forks 441 (observed 2026-08-28T04:09:11.136472+00:00)

## What it is
Harvester is an open-source hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) solution built on Kubernetes that runs on bare metal servers, providing integrated virtualization (via KubeVirt) and distributed block storage (via Longhorn). It offers VM lifecycle management, live migration, backup/restore, and networking, with integration into Rancher for unified container and VM workload management.

## Use cases
- run virtual machines on bare metal servers with a cloud-native stack
- replace proprietary HCI solutions like VMware vSphere with an open-source alternative
- manage VMs and containers from a single Kubernetes-based platform
- set up edge infrastructure with lightweight hyperconverged clusters
- back up, snapshot, and restore VMs to NFS or S3 storage
- live-migrate VMs between hosts with zero downtime
- run Kubernetes clusters inside VMs on top of Harvester

## When to choose
- you want a free, open-source HCI platform built on Linux, KVM, Kubernetes, KubeVirt, and Longhorn
- you need to unify legacy VM workloads with containerized workloads on bare metal
- you want to use the Kubernetes API to manage both VMs and containers
- you operate at the edge or datacenter and prefer direct-attached storage over SANs
- you already use Rancher and want integrated virtualization management

## When to avoid
- you only need container orchestration without virtual machines - plain Kubernetes suffices
- you require advanced enterprise storage features like replication across geographically distant sites
- your hardware lacks virtualization support (KVM) or you run on public cloud VMs
- you need a mature desktop or client OS virtualization experience rather than datacenter infrastructure

## Facets
- artifact type: application
- maturity: stable
- function: container-orchestration, self-hosted, deployment, developer-tools
- domain: infrastructure-as-code, cloud-computing
- platform: self-hosted, go
- tags: hyperconverged-infrastructure, hci, virtualization, kubevirt, longhorn, bare-metal, rancher, vm-management, distributed-storage, devops, linux, kubernetes

## Member repositories
- harvester/harvester (main) score 94

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:09:11.136472+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-29T18:02:00.258707+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/harvester/harvester (fetched 2026-08-28T04:09:11.136472+00:00, sha 06d66f67d221)
  - homepage: https://harvesterhci.io/ (fetched 2026-08-29T08:56:25.182973+00:00, sha ea5035e3f823)
  - site_page: https://docs.harvesterhci.io/ (fetched 2026-08-29T08:56:25.192858+00:00, sha 2272455c8727)
  - site_page: https://docs.harvesterhci.io (fetched 2026-08-29T08:56:25.194980+00:00, sha 2272455c8727)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.