head to head · open source
bigbluebutton vs SubEthaEdit
bigbluebutton has 9,266 GitHub stars, 5,982 forks, 721 open issues and last shipped yesterday. SubEthaEdit has 1,433 stars, 116 forks, 93 open issues and last shipped 12 months ago. bigbluebutton leads on adoption by 547% (9,266 vs 1,433 stars). bigbluebutton is written in TypeScript under LGPL-3.0; SubEthaEdit is written in Objective-C under MIT. bigbluebutton has attracted 65% as many forks as stars, SubEthaEdit 8%. bigbluebutton was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (collaboration), 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
| bigbluebutton | SubEthaEdit | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 9.3K | ★ 1.4K |
| License | LGPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Objective-C |
| Last push | 2026-11-04 | 2025-11-09 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.0K | ⑂ 116 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick bigbluebutton if
- You weight community size — 9.3K stars and counting
- You want the LGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick SubEthaEdit if
- You want the SubEthaEdit feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Objective-C
- You evaluated both and SubEthaEdit fits your workflow better
About bigbluebutton
BigBlueButton ============= BigBlueButton is an open source virtual classroom designed to help teachers teach and learners learn. BigBlueButton supports real time sharing of audio, video, slides (with whiteboard annotations), chat, and the screen. Instructors can engage remote students with polling, emojis, multi user whiteboards, shared notes, and breakout rooms. During the session, BigBlueButton generates analytics that are visible to moderators in the Learning Analytics Dashboard. Presenters can record and playback content for later sharing with others. We designed BigBlueButton for online learning, it can be…
read the full bigbluebutton overview →
About SubEthaEdit
SubEthaEdit General purpose plain text editor for macOS. Widely known for its live collaboration feature. github.com/subethaedit/SubEthaEdit is the main development repository. subethaedit.net is the base for the official releases in and out of the app store. Getting Started These instructions will get you a copy of the project up and running on your local machine for development and testing purposes. Prerequisites Development is done on most recent macOS and you are expected to have a apple developer account. Clone the repo, and switch to the develop branch Initialise the submodules by Edit the…
read the full SubEthaEdit overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is bigbluebutton or SubEthaEdit more popular?
bigbluebutton has 9,266 GitHub stars and SubEthaEdit has 1,433. bigbluebutton has the larger community by that measure.
Are bigbluebutton and SubEthaEdit free?
Both are open source. bigbluebutton is licensed under LGPL-3.0 and SubEthaEdit under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between bigbluebutton and SubEthaEdit?
bigbluebutton is written in TypeScript and SubEthaEdit in Objective-C. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, bigbluebutton or SubEthaEdit?
Choose bigbluebutton if you want the larger community (9,266 stars) or its LGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose SubEthaEdit if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.