Meltano ranks #10 in Data Engineering & ETL/ELT Pipelines AI search.

Meltano is an open-source, code-first ELT platform originally created inside GitLab in 2018, spun out as an independent company in 2021, and now stewarded by Matatika since 2026. It gives data engineers a declarative, Git-native way to build and manage data pipelines using the Singer connector standard, with 600+ pre-built taps and targets accessible via CLI, YAML configuration, or a web UI. Meltano bundles native dbt integration for transformation, supports Apache Airflow and Dagster for orchestration, and applies software development best practices—version control, CI/CD, environment isolation—to the full data stack. Available as a free self-managed open-source project (MIT license) or a managed Meltano Cloud offering, it targets analytics engineers and data teams seeking flexibility, extensibility, and cost efficiency. The platform has a community of over 5,500 data professionals and is used by more than 2,000 organizations.