head to head · open source
Better Auth vs melody-auth
Better Auth has 30,008 GitHub stars, 2,895 forks, 723 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. melody-auth has 638 stars, 66 forks, 3 open issues and last shipped 17 days ago. Better Auth leads on adoption by 4,603% (30,008 vs 638 stars). Better Auth is written in TypeScript under MIT; melody-auth is written in TypeScript under MIT. Better Auth has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, melody-auth 10%. Better Auth was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (oauth2, oidc), 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
| Better Auth | melody-auth | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 30K | ★ 638 |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.9K | ⑂ 66 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Better Auth if
- You weight community size — 30K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick melody-auth if
- You want the melody-auth feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and melody-auth fits your workflow better
About Better Auth
Better Auth is a framework agnostic authentication and authorization framework written in TypeScript. It targets the broader JavaScript/TypeScript ecosystem and is designed to integrate with any backend or frontend framework, including Next.js, Express, SvelteKit, and others. It provides a unified API surface for core identity workflows such as sign up, sign in, session management, and passwordless flows.
read the full Better Auth overview →
About melody-auth
Melody Auth is an MIT licensed, TypeScript written OAuth 2.0 and authentication server that runs on both Cloudflare Workers and Node.js, and it is aimed at teams that want to host their own identity provider instead of renting one.
read the full melody-auth overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Better Auth or melody-auth more popular?
Better Auth has 30,008 GitHub stars and melody-auth has 638. Better Auth has the larger community by that measure.
Are Better Auth and melody-auth free?
Both are open source. Better Auth is licensed under MIT and melody-auth under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Better Auth and melody-auth?
Better Auth is written in TypeScript and melody-auth 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, Better Auth or melody-auth?
Choose Better Auth if you want the larger community (30,008 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose melody-auth if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.