Comparison
NanoMQ vs Eclipse Mosquitto
NanoMQ (EMQ Technologies) is listed as Connectivity, MQTT Broker, Edge; Eclipse Mosquitto (Eclipse Foundation) as Connectivity, MQTT Broker. No direct integration between them is listed. Last reviewed October 19, 2026.
Head-to-head
NanoMQ vs Eclipse Mosquitto: key differences
Every row cites the vendor's own pages
Both are small, free, open-source MQTT 5 brokers that fit on edge hardware. Eclipse Mosquitto is the long-standing EPL/EDL-licensed default, with bridging in the open-source broker and HA, integrations and persistent queuing in Cedalo's commercial Pro Edition. NanoMQ, from EMQ (the makers of EMQX), is MIT-licensed, multi-threaded, and ships edge-to-cloud features in the open-source build: QUIC bridging, message persistence, a SQL rule engine and WebHooks.
| Topic | NanoMQ | Eclipse Mosquitto |
|---|---|---|
| License[3, 4, 6] | MIT. | EPL-2.0 or EDL-1.0 (SPDX: EPL-2.0 OR BSD-3-Clause). |
| Project[2, 4] | Open-sourced by EMQ in January 2021; built on the NNG networking library. | Eclipse Foundation project whose development is driven by Cedalo. |
| MQTT versions[3, 4] | MQTT 5.0, 3.1.1 and 3.1. | MQTT 5.0, 3.1.1 and 3.1. |
| Footprint & threading[1, 3, 4] | Pure C, asynchronous I/O and multi-threading across cores; booting footprint under 200 KB in the minimum feature set. Claims up to 10x Mosquitto's throughput on multi-core CPUs (vendor claim). | Lightweight enough for low-power single-board computers up to full servers. |
| Bridging[1, 2, 7] | MQTT bridges to multiple clouds over TCP or QUIC; AWS IoT Core bridge; NNG pub/sub bridging. | Bridges connect brokers together, configured in mosquitto.conf. |
| Offline buffering[1, 2, 3, 4] | Built-in message persistence that resumes uploading when the connection returns; optional SQLite build; MQTT Stream stores and queries topic data. | Persistent queuing is a feature of Cedalo's commercial Pro Edition. |
| Rules & integrations[1, 2, 4, 7] | SQL-based rule engine, eKuiper stream processing, WebHooks and HTTP APIs; ZeroMQ, SOME/IP and DDS gateways. | Listeners for MQTT, MQTT over WebSockets or an HTTP API; integrations and REST APIs come with the Pro Edition. |
| Install[2, 3, 4, 5] | Docker image (emqx/nanomq), Linux and Windows packages, or build from source on POSIX platforms (x86_64, ARM). | Windows installers, Homebrew on macOS, snap or distribution packages on Linux, Raspberry Pi; public test broker at test.mosquitto.org. |
Consider NanoMQ when…
- You need an edge broker that buffers data through outages and bridges to a cloud broker (including over QUIC) without buying a commercial edition.
- Your gateway has several cores and you want a multi-threaded broker under a permissive MIT license.
Consider Eclipse Mosquitto when…
- You want the most widely documented small broker for a pilot, a gateway or a Raspberry Pi.
- Plain broker-to-broker bridging is enough, or you plan to buy Cedalo's Pro Edition for HA and integrations.
“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 | NanoMQ | Eclipse Mosquitto |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | EMQ Technologies | Eclipse Foundation |
| Categories | Connectivity, MQTT Broker, Edge | Connectivity, MQTT Broker |
| Ecosystems | Vendor-neutral, Open source | Vendor-neutral, Open source |
| Pricing model | Free (open source, MIT) | Free (open source) |
| Listed integrations | 0 | 1 |
| Website | https://nanomq.io | https://mosquitto.org |
| Direct link | No direct integration listed | |
Shared integrations
None listed yet.
Sources
- [1]NanoMQ: project home page: https://nanomq.io/
- [2]NanoMQ docs: Introduction: https://nanomq.io/docs/en/latest/
- [3]NanoMQ on GitHub: README and LICENSE (MIT): https://github.com/nanomq/nanomq
- [4]Eclipse Mosquitto: project home page: https://mosquitto.org/
- [5]Eclipse Mosquitto: download page: https://mosquitto.org/download/
- [6]Mosquitto on GitHub: LICENSE.txt (EPL-2.0 OR BSD-3-Clause): https://github.com/eclipse-mosquitto/mosquitto/blob/master/LICENSE.txt
- [7]Mosquitto docs: mosquitto.conf man page: https://mosquitto.org/man/mosquitto-conf-5.html
- Checked October 19, 2026. Prices are vendor list prices as shown on that date and may change.
- NanoMQ: official site https://nanomq.io
- Eclipse Mosquitto: official site https://mosquitto.org
- Integration links: PlantWired editorial directory (methodology)
See everything that works with NanoMQ or Eclipse Mosquitto.
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Editorial comparison based on public information. Not a recommendation; verify specifics with each vendor.