head to head · open source
Airbyte vs hop
Airbyte has 22,082 GitHub stars, 5,350 forks, 2,395 open issues and last shipped yesterday. hop has 1,465 stars, 477 forks, 431 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Airbyte leads on adoption by 1,407% (22,082 vs 1,465 stars). Airbyte is written in Python under a custom or non-standard licence; hop is written in Java under Apache-2.0. Airbyte has attracted 24% as many forks as stars, hop 33%. Airbyte was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (data-integration, etl, java), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| Airbyte | hop | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 22K | ★ 1.5K |
| License | Custom / other | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Python | Java |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.3K | ⑂ 477 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Airbyte if
- You weight community size — 22K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick hop if
- You want the hop feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You evaluated both and hop fits your workflow better
About Airbyte
Airbyte open source data movement project. It lives in data engineering and data integration ecosystem. It moves data from APIs, databases, and files into warehouses, data lakes, and AI applications. It supports ELT and ETL pipelines. It also supports AI agents needing business data.
read the full Airbyte overview →
About hop
Apache Hop is an open source data and metadata orchestration platform in the Apache ecosystem. It is written in Java, licensed under Apache 2.0, and positioned for data engineering and integration work. Its stated aim is to facilitate all aspects of data and metadata orchestration.
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Frequently asked questions
Is Airbyte or hop more popular?
Airbyte has 22,082 GitHub stars and hop has 1,465. Airbyte has the larger community by that measure.
Are Airbyte and hop free?
Both are open source. Airbyte has no licence declared in this registry, and hop is licensed under Apache-2.0. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Airbyte and hop?
Airbyte is written in Python and hop in Java. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Airbyte or hop?
Choose Airbyte if you want the larger community (22,082 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose hop if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.