head to head · open source
Zulip vs bigbluebutton
Zulip has 25,929 GitHub stars, 10,263 forks, 2,008 open issues and last shipped yesterday. bigbluebutton has 9,223 stars, 5,982 forks, 721 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. Zulip leads on adoption by 181% (25,929 vs 9,223 stars). Zulip is written in Python under Apache-2.0; bigbluebutton is written in JavaScript under LGPL-3.0. Zulip has attracted 40% as many forks as stars, bigbluebutton 65%. Zulip 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
| Zulip | bigbluebutton | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 26K | ★ 9.2K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | LGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Python | JavaScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-19 | 2026-09-18 |
| Forks | ⑂ 10K | ⑂ 6.0K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Zulip if
- You weight community size — 26K 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 bigbluebutton if
- You want the bigbluebutton feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the LGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You evaluated both and bigbluebutton fits your workflow better
About Zulip
Zulip is an open source organized team chat application built on topic based threading, aimed at distributed teams that need live and asynchronous conversation in one place, and it is positioned as an open alternative to Slack.
read the full Zulip overview →
About bigbluebutton
BigBlueButton is an open source web conferencing system built for virtual classes, described by its maintainers as an open source virtual classroom designed to help teachers teach and learners learn. It lives in the JavaScript ecosystem and is distributed under the LGPL 3.0 license. The project has been developed for roughly sixteen years, carries 9,215 stars and 5,978 forks on GitHub, and its latest release is BigBlueButton 3.0. It supports real time sharing of audio, video, slides with whiteboard annotations, chat, and screen, and it ships with GreenLight as its default front end.
read the full bigbluebutton overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Zulip or bigbluebutton more popular?
Zulip has 25,929 GitHub stars and bigbluebutton has 9,223. Zulip has the larger community by that measure.
Are Zulip and bigbluebutton free?
Both are open source. Zulip is licensed under Apache-2.0 and bigbluebutton under LGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Zulip and bigbluebutton?
Zulip is written in Python and bigbluebutton in JavaScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Zulip or bigbluebutton?
Choose Zulip if you want the larger community (25,929 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose bigbluebutton if its feature set, stack or LGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.