Choosing the Right Key-Value Store: Redis vs Valkey - Percona

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Not long ago, picking an in-memory key-value store was easy. Redis was the default. Fast, simple, everywhere.
Then the rules changed. Redis moved to a much more restrictive license. Suddenly, many companies had to rethink their plans, especially if they cared about staying open source or needed flexibility for the cloud.
That’s when Valkey arrived. It’s a fork of Redis, created by the open source community and backed by heavy hitters like AWS and Google Cloud. The difference? Valkey is truly open source and run by the Linux Foundation. No hidden strings, no gotchas.
So, where does that leave you? Do you stick with Redis? Jump to Valkey? The answer isn’t a simple “one is better.” It depends entirely on your project’s needs, performance requirements, and considerations for software licensing and support.
Before we get into features, let’s call out the one thing that sets Valkey and Redis on different paths: licensing.
This distinction between community-driven open source and vendor-controlled source-available is the central issue driving the decision for many developers.
Think of it like this:
With Valkey, you can run it anywhere, for any purpose. You can customize it, embed it in commercial products you sell, or even build your own cloud database service with it. You are in complete control. What you don’t get are the proprietary, pre-packaged modules or a single-vendor support contract that Redis Enterprise offers.
With open source Redis, you can use it freely for most internal applications. However, you cannot easily offer it as a commercial cloud service or embed it in certain types of commercial software without navigating the restrictive license terms. You are also limited to its single-threaded performance.
With Redis Enterprise, you can immediately access advanced features like native Vector Search or JSON support and get a direct enterprise support contract. You cannot, however, treat it like open source. You are operating within the rules, pricing, and product roadmap of a single commercial vendor.
To make an informed decision, it’s best to compare Valkey against its two distinct alternatives separately. First, let’s look at the core open source engines.