Crates / etcetera / Alternatives
Rust crate alternatives · data Oct 24, 2026
Alternatives to etcetera
Short answerThe closest alternatives to etcetera on crates.io data are dirs (1M real downloads a day), dirs-next (230K real downloads a day), matchit (1.6M real downloads a day). Of the 8 we list, the most used is toml_datetime, and 6 shipped a release in the last year. etcetera itself gets 463,193 a day with 224 dependents.
Every alternative we found
| Alternative | Real downloads a day | vs etcetera | Dependents | Last release | Why it is listed | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| dirs Foundational | 1,029,176 | 2.22x | 11,001 | 49d | keyword "basedir", keyword "path" | compare |
| dirs-next Established | 230,358 | 0.50x | 462 | 6.0y | keyword "basedir", keyword "path" | compare |
| matchit Established | 1,597,322 | 3.45x | 207 | 7mo | keyword "path" | compare |
| pathdiff Established | 492,592 | 1.06x | 661 | 23mo | keyword "path" | compare |
| relative-path Established | 342,966 | 0.74x | 140 | 3d | keyword "path" | compare |
| os_str_bytes Pulled in | 211,293 | 0.46x | 47 | 3mo | keyword "path" | compare |
| toml_datetime Pulled in | 3,215,444 | 6.94x | 29 | 16d | category Configuration | compare |
| toml Foundational | 2,960,881 | 6.39x | 20,777 | 15d | category Configuration | compare |
How to choose
- Same job, not the same API. Each line is listed because it shares a crates.io category or keyword with etcetera; read its description before you swap.
- More dependents means more answered questions and a smaller chance it disappears.
- Check the last release against how fast you need fixes. For etcetera: is it still maintained?
Rules
Alternatives = tracked crates (top 1000 by downloads) that share a specific crates.io category (2 points each) or keyword (3 points each) with etcetera, most similar first; its own parts (same name prefix) and crates it depends on or that depend on it are left out, because those are companions, not substitutes. Real downloads = quiet-day median, crates.io data Oct 24, 2026. Built when we find 3 or more.
Up next
The closest alternative: Foundational and steady. 1,029,176 real downloads a day.dirsRust crate. A tiny low-level library that provides platform-specific standard locations of directories for config, cache and other data on Linux, Windows, macOS and...Read it next →Also worth your time