head to head · open source
storybook vs BookStack
storybook has 91,081 GitHub stars, 10,452 forks, 1,831 open issues and last shipped yesterday. BookStack has 19,048 stars, 2,422 forks, 3 open issues and last shipped yesterday. storybook leads on adoption by 378% (91,081 vs 19,048 stars). storybook is written in TypeScript under MIT; BookStack is written in PHP under MIT. storybook has attracted 11% as many forks as stars, BookStack 13%. storybook 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
| storybook | BookStack | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 91K | ★ 19K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | PHP |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 10K | ⑂ 2.4K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick storybook if
- You weight community size — 91K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick BookStack if
- You want the BookStack feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You evaluated both and BookStack fits your workflow better
About storybook
Storybook is an open source, MIT licensed frontend workshop, written in TypeScript, for building, documenting, and testing UI components and pages in isolation, aimed at frontend engineers and design system teams working in React, Angular, Vue, Svelte, React Native, HTML, and other supported renderers.
read the full storybook overview →
About BookStack
BookStack is a self hosted documentation platform written in PHP on top of the Laravel framework, released under the MIT license. It is described by its maintainers as an opinionated platform for storing and organising information and documentation, and it is distributed as an open source project whose development is now managed on Codeberg. The project has existed for roughly eleven years and carries a substantial community footprint, with more than nineteen thousand stars and over two thousand forks recorded against its repository history.
read the full BookStack overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is storybook or BookStack more popular?
storybook has 91,081 GitHub stars and BookStack has 19,048. storybook has the larger community by that measure.
Are storybook and BookStack free?
Both are open source. storybook is licensed under MIT and BookStack under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between storybook and BookStack?
storybook is written in TypeScript and BookStack in PHP. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, storybook or BookStack?
Choose storybook if you want the larger community (91,081 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose BookStack if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.