head to head · open source
Appwrite vs sandboxd
Appwrite has 57,400 GitHub stars, 5,725 forks, 1,008 open issues and last shipped yesterday. sandboxd has 944 stars, 59 forks, 14 open issues and last shipped 9 days ago. Appwrite leads on adoption by 5,981% (57,400 vs 944 stars). Appwrite is written in PHP under BSD-3-Clause; sandboxd is written in Go under MIT. Appwrite has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, sandboxd 6%. Appwrite was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (docker), 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
| Appwrite | sandboxd | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 57K | ★ 944 |
| License | BSD-3-Clause | MIT |
| Written in | PHP | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-09 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.7K | ⑂ 59 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Appwrite if
- You weight community size — 57K stars and counting
- You want the BSD-3-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick sandboxd if
- You want the sandboxd feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and sandboxd fits your workflow better
About Appwrite
Appwrite is an open source backend platform that consolidates infrastructure services—authentication, databases, storage, functions, messaging, hosting, and real time capabilities—into a single, unified system. It runs as a self hosted service or via a managed cloud offering (Appwrite Cloud), targeting developers who want to avoid assembling and maintaining disparate backend tools.
read the full Appwrite overview →
About sandboxd
sandboxd is an open source, self hosted AI app builder that runs a coding agent inside isolated sandboxes on your own server and gives every generated app its own live preview URL, and it is built for developers and teams who want the prompt to app workflow of hosted builders without giving up their infrastructure, code, or data.
read the full sandboxd overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Appwrite or sandboxd more popular?
Appwrite has 57,400 GitHub stars and sandboxd has 944. Appwrite has the larger community by that measure.
Are Appwrite and sandboxd free?
Both are open source. Appwrite is licensed under BSD-3-Clause and sandboxd under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Appwrite and sandboxd?
Appwrite is written in PHP and sandboxd in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Appwrite or sandboxd?
Choose Appwrite if you want the larger community (57,400 stars) or its BSD-3-Clause licence terms. Choose sandboxd if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.