head to head · open source
Airbyte vs squid-sdk
Airbyte has 22,083 GitHub stars, 5,351 forks, 2,395 open issues and last shipped today. squid-sdk has 1,340 stars, 202 forks, 57 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Airbyte leads on adoption by 1,548% (22,083 vs 1,340 stars). Airbyte is written in Python under a custom or non-standard licence; squid-sdk is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0. Airbyte has attracted 24% as many forks as stars, squid-sdk 15%. Airbyte was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (etl), 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 | squid-sdk | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 22K | ★ 1.3K |
| License | Custom / other | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Python | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.4K | ⑂ 202 |
| 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 squid-sdk if
- You want the squid-sdk feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and squid-sdk 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 squid-sdk
Squid SDK an ETL framework for Web3 data Squid SDK is a TypeScript ETL toolkit for blockchain data, that currently supports Ethereum and everything Ethereum like Substrate based chains Solana. Squid SDK is distinguished by Being a toolkit (rather than an indexing app like TheGraph or Ponder) Fast binary data codecs and type safe access to decoded data Native support for sourcing the data from SQD Network. The latter is a key point, as SQD Network is a decentralized data lake and query engine, that allows to granularly select and stream subset of block data to lightweight clients while providing high performance c…
read the full squid-sdk overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Airbyte or squid-sdk more popular?
Airbyte has 22,083 GitHub stars and squid-sdk has 1,340. Airbyte has the larger community by that measure.
Are Airbyte and squid-sdk free?
Both are open source. Airbyte has no licence declared in this registry, and squid-sdk is licensed under Apache-2.0. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Airbyte and squid-sdk?
Airbyte is written in Python and squid-sdk in TypeScript. 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 squid-sdk?
Choose Airbyte if you want the larger community (22,083 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose squid-sdk if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.