head to head · open source
azerothcore-wotlk vs zinx
azerothcore-wotlk has 9,142 GitHub stars, 3,943 forks, 2,445 open issues and last shipped yesterday. zinx has 7,760 stars, 1,262 forks, 96 open issues and last shipped 14 days ago. azerothcore-wotlk leads on adoption by 18% (9,142 vs 7,760 stars). azerothcore-wotlk is written in C++ under GPL-2.0; zinx is written in Go under MIT. azerothcore-wotlk has attracted 43% as many forks as stars, zinx 16%. azerothcore-wotlk was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (game-server), 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.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| azerothcore-wotlk | zinx | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 9.1K | ★ 7.8K |
| License | GPL-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | C++ | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-04 | 2026-10-22 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.9K | ⑂ 1.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick azerothcore-wotlk if
- You weight community size — 9.1K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick zinx if
- You want the zinx feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and zinx fits your workflow better
About azerothcore-wotlk
AzerothCore Build Status Introduction AzerothCore is an open source game server application and framework designed for hosting massively multiplayer online role playing games (MMORPGs). It is based on the popular MMORPG World of Warcraft (WoW) and seeks to recreate the gameplay experience of the original game from patch 3.3.5a. The original code is based on MaNGOS, TrinityCore, and SunwellCore and has since then had extensive development to improve stability, in game mechanics, and modularity to the game. AC has also grown into a community driven project with a significant number of contributors and developers…
read the full azerothcore-wotlk overview →
About zinx
English 简体中文 Zinx is a lightweight concurrent server framework based on Golang. Document Note : Zinx has been widely used in many enterprises for development purposes, including message forwarding for backend modules, long linked game servers, and message handling plugins for web frameworks. Zinx is positioned as a framework with concise code that allows developers to quickly understand the internal details of the framework and easily customize it based on their own enterprise scenarios. Source of Zinx Website Online Tutorial Online Tutorial Video I. One word that has been said before Why did we create Zinx?…
More in Miscellaneous
Related comparisons
More Gaming projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Gaming field.
Frequently asked questions
Is azerothcore-wotlk or zinx more popular?
azerothcore-wotlk has 9,142 GitHub stars and zinx has 7,760. azerothcore-wotlk has the larger community by that measure.
Are azerothcore-wotlk and zinx free?
Both are open source. azerothcore-wotlk is licensed under GPL-2.0 and zinx under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between azerothcore-wotlk and zinx?
azerothcore-wotlk is written in C++ and zinx 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, azerothcore-wotlk or zinx?
Choose azerothcore-wotlk if you want the larger community (9,142 stars) or its GPL-2.0 licence terms. Choose zinx if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.