Zvec: A lightweight, fast, in-process vector database

Zvec just dropped a “no server, no fuss” vector search that lives inside your app. Translation for non-nerds: it’s a tiny tool you install with pip that helps find “things that feel alike,” fast—like matching text or images by meaning. Built on Alibaba’s Proxima, it promises speed, scale, and multi-vector tricks, plus hybrid filters for precise results. The pitch: billions of items searched in milliseconds, from laptops to edge devices. The vibe: bold. The crowd: skeptical but curious.

Commenters immediately pulled out measuring tapes. simonw flagged Zvec’s self-reported “7x faster than Pinecone,” and the thread turned into “show us the receipts.” Others asked for head-to-heads with rivals: clemlesne wants uSearch, while cjonas name-dropped DuckDB’s vector add-on. skybrian wondered if these “similarity searches” actually help classify text, and pdp threw cold water with a hardware reality check: do you hit memory limits before CPU? Jokes flew: benchmarks are “gym selfies,” and “in-process” was dubbed “no meetings, just vibes.” Fans love the simplicity—install, insert, query, done—but skeptics want independent tests, larger datasets, and clear trade-offs. Result: hype meets homework. If Zvec’s claims hold, devs get instant, server-free search superpowers. If not, it’s just another chart with tiny bars and big promises today.