--- title: Rust is not a good C replacement | daily.dev description: A 2019 opinion piece arguing that Rust is not a suitable replacement for C. The author contends that Rust shares C++'s 'kitchen sink' philosophy of solving... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/rust-is-not-a-good-c-replacement-dwodwmhox twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Rust is not a good C replacement | daily.dev og:description: A 2019 opinion piece arguing that Rust is not a suitable replacement for C. The author contends that Rust shares C++'s 'kitchen sink' philosophy of solving... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/rust-is-not-a-good-c-replacement-dwodwmhox og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/DwODWmhox.png og:image:alt: Rust is not a good C replacement og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Rust is not a good C replacement **[Drew DeVault](https://daily.dev/sources/drewdevault)** · 6 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary A 2019 opinion piece arguing that Rust is not a suitable replacement for C. The author contends that Rust shares C++'s 'kitchen sink' philosophy of solving problems by adding language features, making it increasingly complex and hard to track idiomatically. Key criticisms include: Rust's lack of a formal spec, no stable ABI, mandatory Cargo build system, limited portability compared to C, and the dubious value of 'fearless concurrency' for most systems programs. The author suggests that C's true replacement will be simpler, not more complex, pointing to Go as a better example of targeted simplicity. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Rust is a disappointment](https://daily.dev/posts/rust-is-a-disappointment-stnsaxzae) · Hacker News · 26 upvotes · 9 comments - [Rust is Just a Tool](https://daily.dev/posts/rust-is-just-a-tool-epvi4zuzn) · Hacker News · 33 upvotes · 2 comments - [Why I don't love Rust \(either\)](https://daily.dev/posts/why-i-don-t-love-rust-either--64xgca2jb) · Lobsters · 10 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#golang](https://daily.dev/tags/golang), [#c](https://daily.dev/tags/c), [#rust](https://daily.dev/tags/rust), [#language-design](https://daily.dev/tags/language-design) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/rust-is-not-a-good-c-replacement-dwodwmhox) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Rust is not a good C replacement","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/rust-is-not-a-good-c-replacement-dwodwmhox","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/rust-is-not-a-good-c-replacement-dwodwmhox"},"datePublished":"2026-03-31T12:28:43.047Z","dateModified":"2026-03-31T12:45:09.041Z","description":"A 2019 opinion piece arguing that Rust is not a suitable replacement for C. 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