Comparison
Canary Historian vs TDengine
Canary Historian (Canary Labs) is listed as Historian; TDengine (TDengine) as Historian, Time-series DB. No direct integration between them is listed. Last reviewed October 19, 2026.
Canary Historian
Canary Labs · 4 integrations
TDengine
TDengine · 3 integrations
Head-to-head
Canary Historian vs TDengine: key differences
Every row cites the vendor's own pages
Two of the few historians that publish prices, both by tag count. Canary is a classic process historian with its own lossless storage, store-and-forward collectors and unlimited Axiom and Excel clients. TDengine sells a time-series database plus an industrial data platform (TDengine All-in-One) that is free up to 5,000 tags, with an AGPL-3.0 open-source core and built-in stream processing and AI analytics.
| Topic | Canary Historian | TDengine |
|---|---|---|
| What it is[1, 4, 5, 6] | Process historian with its own storage, Axiom trending, Excel clients and store-and-forward collectors. | Time-series database for Industrial IoT (TDengine TSDB) plus an industrial data management platform (TDengine IDMP), sold together as TDengine All-in-One. |
| Pricing model[1, 5] | By tag count, perpetual or annual subscription; Enterprise licensing for unlimited tags. | By tag count, annual or perpetual license; high availability +30%; over 500,000 or unlimited tags on quote. |
| Free tier[1, 5] | No free tier on the pricing page. | Free up to 5,000 tags, including small production use; support optional (US$3,375/year). |
| Example prices[1, 5] | 3,500 tags: US$9,970 license + US$1,795 CustomerCare perpetual (US$11,765), or US$3,980/year subscription. | 10,000 tags: US$15,500/year or US$38,750 perpetual (+US$5,813/year optional support). 100,000 tags: US$46,000/year or US$115,000 perpetual. |
| Open source[1, 6, 7] | Commercial software under Canary's Software License Agreement. | Core database, including clustering, open source as TDengine OSS under AGPL-3.0. |
| Data collection[2, 3, 4, 5] | Collectors for OPC UA, OPC DA, MQTT Sparkplug B (or JSON), SQL and CSV, not separately licensed; Store & Forward buffers to disk during outages. | Zero-code connectors for MQTT, Kafka, OPC, PI System and more, plus edge-to-cloud replication, in all plans. |
| Analytics & clients[1, 5] | Unlimited Axiom and Excel clients; ODBC connector available as an upgrade. | SQL, stream processing, AI forecasting and anomaly detection, data modeling, dashboards, event management and an Excel add-in included. |
| Managed cloud[1, 5] | Canary Private Cloud on US Azure, from US$12,320/year for 3,500 tags, plus US$1,500 one-time setup. | TDengine Cloud on AWS, Azure or Google Cloud, from US$970/month (Starter, 5,000 tags). |
| Deployment[2, 4, 5, 6, 8] | Self-hosted historian server with collectors installed close to the data source. | Linux and Windows packages, Docker or Kubernetes; edge, VM, on-prem server or cloud. |
Consider Canary Historian when…
- You want a proven process historian with lossless storage, unlimited trending clients and support included in the price.
- Your plant runs OPC and Sparkplug B data sources and you want unlicensed collectors with store-and-forward.
Consider TDengine when…
- You are under 5,000 tags and want a free production start, or you want an open-source database core you can inspect.
- You want SQL, stream processing, AI analytics and PI System or Kafka ingestion in one product.
“Consider when” points are PlantWired's editorial reading of the sourced facts above, not vendor claims or a recommendation.
Directory listing side by side
| Attribute | Canary Historian | TDengine |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | Canary Labs | TDengine |
| Categories | Historian | Historian, Time-series DB |
| Ecosystems | Ignition, Vendor-neutral | Vendor-neutral, Open source |
| Pricing model | Tag-based license | Free up to 5,000 tags; published annual or perpetual prices by tag count |
| Listed integrations | 4 | 3 |
| Website | https://www.canarylabs.com | https://tdengine.com |
| Direct link | No direct integration listed | |
Shared integrations
None listed yet.
Sources
- [1]Canary Labs: data historian pricing: https://www.canarylabs.com/pricing
- [2]Canary help center: Data Collector Overview (version 26): https://helpcenter.canarylabs.com/t/q6ypl9f/data-collector-overview-and-methodology-version-26
- [3]Canary help center: Store & Forward Buffer (version 26): https://helpcenter.canarylabs.com/t/g9ygfcr/store-forward-buffer-version-26
- [4]Canary System Whitepaper (2025, PDF): https://blog.canarylabs.com/hubfs/Canary%20System%20Whitepaper%202025.pdf
- [5]TDengine: All-in-One pricing: https://tdengine.com/pricing/
- [6]TDengine on GitHub: README and LICENSE (AGPL-3.0): https://github.com/taosdata/TDengine
- [7]TDengine: Open Source (TDengine OSS): https://tdengine.com/tdengine/open-source-time-series-database/
- [8]TDengine docs: Get started with an installation package: https://docs.tdengine.com/get-started/package/
- Checked October 19, 2026. Prices are vendor list prices as shown on that date and may change.
- Canary Historian: official site https://www.canarylabs.com
- TDengine: official site https://tdengine.com
- Integration links: PlantWired editorial directory (methodology)
See everything that works with Canary Historian or TDengine.
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Editorial comparison based on public information. Not a recommendation; verify specifics with each vendor.