Crates / inventory / Alternatives
Rust crate alternatives · data Oct 24, 2026
Alternatives to inventory
Short answerThe closest alternatives to inventory on crates.io data are litrs (719K real downloads a day), ctor (687K real downloads a day), syn (8.4M real downloads a day). Of the 8 we list, the most used is syn, and 8 shipped a release in the last year. inventory itself gets 449,319 a day with 1,291 dependents.
Every alternative we found
| Alternative | Real downloads a day | vs inventory | Dependents | Last release | Why it is listed | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| litrs Pulled in | 718,877 | 1.60x | 96 | 12d | category Build Utils, category Procedural macro helpers | compare |
| ctor Established | 686,862 | 1.53x | 848 | 2mo | category Build Utils, category No dynamic allocation | compare |
| syn Foundational | 8,378,886 | 18.65x | 18,848 | 12d | category Procedural macro helpers | compare |
| quote Foundational | 5,007,445 | 11.14x | 18,227 | 3mo | category Procedural macro helpers | compare |
| proc-macro2 Foundational | 4,890,919 | 10.89x | 16,351 | 3mo | category Procedural macro helpers | compare |
| unicode-ident Established | 4,390,154 | 9.77x | 222 | 12d | category No dynamic allocation, category No standard library | compare |
| cc Widely used | 3,852,250 | 8.57x | 4,294 | 1d | category Build Utils | compare |
| autocfg Pulled in | 3,840,273 | 8.55x | 82 | 5mo | category Build Utils | compare |
How to choose
- Same job, not the same API. Each line is listed because it shares a crates.io category or keyword with inventory; 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 inventory: 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 inventory, 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: Few direct dependents and steady. 718,877 real downloads a day.litrsRust crate. Parse and inspect Rust literals (i.e. tokens in the Rust programming language representing fixed values). Particularly useful for proc macros, but can also...Read it next →Also worth your time