MinIO has transitioned its enterprise offering to AIStor, a licensed object storage platform built on the same S3-compatible foundation. AIStor requires a valid license file to operate — there is no unlicensed mode.
Reference: AIStor Container Installation
| MinIO (Community) | AIStor | |
|---|---|---|
| License | AGPLv3 (open source) | Commercial (license file required) |
| Image | quay.io/minio/minio |
quay.io/minio/aistor/minio |
| S3 API | Yes | Yes |
| Iceberg Tables | No | Native support |
| SFTP Protocol | No | Native support |
| Support | Community only | Paid tiers available |
| Free Tier | N/A | Single compute resource, no support |
A license file is mandatory for AIStor. Options:
- Free Tier — single compute resource with one or more drives, no support included. Request at min.io/pricing → "Get Started".
- Paid Tiers — commercial support and multi-node deployments. See min.io/pricing for details.
Download the license file to a persistent location (e.g. ./minio.license).
# Pull the AIStor image
docker pull quay.io/minio/aistor/minio
# Create data and certificate directories
mkdir -p ./minio/data ./minio/certs
# Run with license file
docker run -dt \
-p 9000:9000 -p 9001:9001 \
-v ./minio/data:/mnt/data \
-v ./minio.license:/minio.license:ro \
-v ./minio/certs:/etc/minio/certs \
--name "aistor-server" \
quay.io/minio/aistor/minio:latest \
minio server /mnt/data --license /minio.licenseDefault credentials: minioadmin / minioadmin
- S3 API:
http://localhost:9000 - Console:
http://localhost:9001
This repository builds MinIO Community Edition from source (RELEASE.2025-10-15T17-29-55Z)
using our fork. The community edition remains AGPLv3 licensed and does not require a license file.
To migrate to AIStor:
- Replace
imagein docker-compose withquay.io/minio/aistor/minio - Remove the source build stage (no longer needed)
- Mount a valid license file into the container
- Add
--license /minio.licenseto the server command