Zilliz (Milvus) vs Qdrant

Side-by-side from the Top 11 ranking of The 11 Best Vector Databases (2026). Last verified May 31, 2026.

The short answer

Zilliz (Milvus) ranks higher on Top 11 (#3 vs #4) for AI engineers building RAG and semantic search at scale. The go-to for massive-scale, enterprise deployments based on open-source Milvus.

At a glance

Zilliz (Milvus)Qdrant
Top 11 rank#3 / The 11 Best Vector Databases (2026)#4 / The 11 Best Vector Databases (2026)
Score (out of 9.4)98.9
Best forEnterprise-grade massive scalabilityPerformance-focused and efficient
Pricing$$$ (Free to custom/enterprise)$$ (Free to custom/enterprise)
HQRedwood City, USABerlin, Germany
Founded20172021

Zilliz (Milvus)

The go-to for massive-scale, enterprise deployments based on open-source Milvus.

zilliz.com

See full entry in The 11 Best Vector Databases (2026)

Qdrant

A highly performant and efficient vector database written in Rust.

qdrant.tech

See full entry in The 11 Best Vector Databases (2026)

Methodology and scoring weights live at /methodology. No vendor pays for placement — see about.