head to head · open source
airflow vs doit
airflow has 47,350 GitHub stars, 18,299 forks, 1,831 open issues and last shipped yesterday. doit has 2,096 stars, 203 forks, 94 open issues and last shipped 1 months ago. airflow leads on adoption by 2,159% (47,350 vs 2,096 stars). airflow is written in Python under Apache-2.0; doit is written in Python under MIT. airflow has attracted 39% as many forks as stars, doit 10%. airflow was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (data-science), 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
| airflow | doit | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 47K | ★ 2.1K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Python | Python |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-09-21 |
| Forks | ⑂ 18K | ⑂ 203 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick airflow if
- You weight community size — 47K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick doit if
- You want the doit feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and doit fits your workflow better
About airflow
Apache Airflow Apache Airflow (or simply Airflow) is a platform to programmatically author, schedule, and monitor workflows. When workflows are defined as code, they become more maintainable, versionable, testable, and collaborative. Use Airflow to author workflows (Dags) that orchestrate tasks. The Airflow scheduler executes your tasks on an array of workers while following the specified dependencies. Rich command line utilities make performing complex surgeries on Dags a snap. The rich user interface makes it easy to visualize pipelines running in production, monitor progress, and troubleshoot issues when…
read the full airflow overview →
About doit
================ README ================ .. display some badges .. image:: :target: .. image:: :target: .. image:: :target: .. image:: :target: pydoit automation tool ========================= Define tasks in Python. Run only what changed. doit is a task management & automation tool like make , but in pure Python. It tracks file dependencies, caches results, and skips tasks that are already up to date. No DSL, no YAML just Python functions. Quick Example ============= Create a dodo.py : .. code:: python def task hello(): """create a greeting file""" return { 'actions': ['echo "Hello from doit" hello.txt']…
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Frequently asked questions
Is airflow or doit more popular?
airflow has 47,350 GitHub stars and doit has 2,096. airflow has the larger community by that measure.
Are airflow and doit free?
Both are open source. airflow is licensed under Apache-2.0 and doit under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between airflow and doit?
airflow is written in Python and doit in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, airflow or doit?
Choose airflow if you want the larger community (47,350 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose doit if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.