# Recommended serialization interface in Oct 2020: JLD, JLD2,

**URL:** https://discourse.julialang.org/t/recommended-serialization-interface-in-oct-2020-jld-jld2/48994
**Category:** New to Julia
**Tags:** question, jld, jld2
**Created:** [October 25, 2020, 7:00pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/recommended-serialization-interface-in-oct-2020-jld-jld2/48994 "2020-10-25T19:00:45Z")
**Posts on this page:** 1
**Showing post:** 2

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### Author: ![ChrisRackauckas](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/chrisrackauckas/32/77_2.png) [@ChrisRackauckas](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/ChrisRackauckas)
#### Post date: [October 26, 2020, 1:13am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/recommended-serialization-interface-in-oct-2020-jld-jld2/48994/2 "2020-10-26T01:13:38Z")

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Sometimes its good to have an open community building a ton of alternatives, sometimes it’s not as good. I think this is a place where it hasn’t turned out so good and someone needs to sit down and consolidate it. The summary right now is:

- Julia’s serialization is the best, but cannot necessarily cross versions.
- HDF5 is stable and won’t change, but that means it supports the basics (arrays and such), and that’s pretty much what it will do.
- JLD2 is great and got new maintainers. That might mean it’s the thing to use from now on, but I haven’t tried it since it got the new crew.
- BSON has some architectural issues and is in a maintenance state where it won’t change much.
- JSON is pretty nice if it works for the types you’re using.
- Anything else I wouldn’t consider, or at least, it’s “use at your own risk” levels of maintenance and use by the community.

I’d probably just stick to JLD2 from now on.

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