Apache Kafka
Apache Kafka is an open-source, distributed event flow platform used for high-performance data lines, flow analytics, data integration, and critical applications. It allows broadcasting and subscribing event streams, storing those streams in a durable manner for the duration of the requested time, and processing instantaneously or retroactively. Topics can even be replicated between data centers; when one server falls, others take over their business without loss of data.
AP
Apache Kafka
100apache · Queues & Streaming
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JavaEvent StreamingDistributedApache-2.0
Common commercial products in this category: Confluent Cloud, Amazon SQS, Amazon Kinesis
What can it do?
- You write event streams on topics, read them as subscribers, and keep them durable for as long as you want.
- With Kafka Streams API, you develop flow processing applications and microservices that transform, merge, collect, and window.
- With Kafka Connect, you run reusable connectors that take data from external systems or write data to them.
Heads up
- • High number of open issues (677)
Verified against README · Oct 26, 2026 · source