Even though most open source projects have very limited contributor pools and often are the handiwork of a single developer (or a single company), it’s easier to attract volunteer contributors when a project sits within a neutral foundation. As such, AWS demonstrated how serious it was about OpenSearch’s open source success when it moved the project to the Linux Foundation in late 2024, establishing the OpenSearch Software Foundation (OSSF). This wasn’t just admin shuffling; it was strategic. Placing the project within a neutral foundation directly addressed concerns about AWS controlling the project. Suddenly the Technical Steering Committee (TSC) boasted representatives from SAP, Uber, Oracle, Bytedance, and others. Additionally, OpenSearch now can claim more than 1,400 unique contributors (over 350 active), hundreds of maintainers across dozens of organizations, and activity spanning more than 100 GitHub repositories by early 2025. Critically, the percentage of contributions and maintainers from outside AWS has significantly increased, signaling progress towards genuine diversification.
For AWS, whose Leadership Principles almost demand control over customer outcomes (“Deliver Results,” etc.), this is a revolutionary change in how it does business.
Getting better all the time
Clearly, OpenSearch is on the correct path. With governance solidifying, OpenSearch has pursued aggressive development, guided by a public road map, pushing beyond its roots to tackle modern data challenges, especially in AI/vector search and observability. OpenSearch has significantly moved beyond mere Elasticsearch compatibility. Driven by user needs, OpenSearch has added vector similarity search, hybrid search combining keyword and semantic methods, and built-in neural search capabilities. In 2024 alone, OpenSearch made major strides—adding integration with Facebook’s FAISS, SIMD hardware acceleration, and vector quantization for high-performance semantic searches.
