head to head · open source
BookStack vs schemaspy
BookStack has 19,125 GitHub stars, 2,435 forks, 3 open issues and last shipped yesterday. schemaspy has 3,736 stars, 357 forks, 303 open issues and last shipped 8 months ago. BookStack leads on adoption by 412% (19,125 vs 3,736 stars). BookStack is written in PHP under MIT; schemaspy is written in HTML under LGPL-3.0. BookStack has attracted 13% as many forks as stars, schemaspy 10%. BookStack was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (documentation), 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
| BookStack | schemaspy | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 19K | ★ 3.7K |
| License | MIT | LGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | PHP | HTML |
| Last push | 2026-11-04 | 2026-03-05 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.4K | ⑂ 357 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick BookStack if
- You weight community size — 19K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick schemaspy if
- You want the schemaspy feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the LGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches HTML
- You evaluated both and schemaspy fits your workflow better
About BookStack
BookStack A platform for storing and organising information and documentation. Details for BookStack can be found on the official website at Installation Instructions Documentation Demo Instance Screenshots BookStack Blog Issue List Community Discussions Support Options 📚 Project Definition BookStack is an opinionated documentation platform that provides a pleasant and simple out of the box experience. New users to an instance should find the experience intuitive and only basic word processing skills should be required to get involved in creating content on BookStack. The platform should provide advanced power…
read the full BookStack overview →
About schemaspy
SchemaSpy is a database metadata analyzer. It helps your database administrators and developers visualize, navigate and understand your data model. With an easy to use HTML based report, traversing the entity relationship diagram has never been simpler. Our product showcase is available at Installation SchemaSpy is a standalone application without GUI. Just download the latest JAR file or Docker image and you're ready to go! To use SchemaSpy from Maven, please see the Maven chapter below. For unreleased bug fixes and features in progress, download our snapshot JAR or use Docker tag snapshot Maven SchemaSpy…
read the full schemaspy overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is BookStack or schemaspy more popular?
BookStack has 19,125 GitHub stars and schemaspy has 3,736. BookStack has the larger community by that measure.
Are BookStack and schemaspy free?
Both are open source. BookStack is licensed under MIT and schemaspy under LGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between BookStack and schemaspy?
BookStack is written in PHP and schemaspy in HTML. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, BookStack or schemaspy?
Choose BookStack if you want the larger community (19,125 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose schemaspy if its feature set, stack or LGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.