head to head · open source
Bruno vs php-vcr
Bruno has 47,022 GitHub stars, 2,888 forks, 1,831 open issues and last shipped yesterday. php-vcr has 1,212 stars, 215 forks, 24 open issues and last shipped 5 days ago. Bruno leads on adoption by 3,780% (47,022 vs 1,212 stars). Bruno is written in JavaScript under MIT; php-vcr is written in PHP under MIT. Bruno has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, php-vcr 18%. Bruno was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (api-testing), 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
| Bruno | php-vcr | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 47K | ★ 1.2K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | JavaScript | PHP |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-13 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.9K | ⑂ 215 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Bruno if
- You weight community size — 47K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick php-vcr if
- You want the php-vcr feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You evaluated both and php-vcr fits your workflow better
About Bruno
Bruno is a lightweight, open source API client and IDE for exploring and testing APIs, built for developers and teams who want their request collections stored as plain text in a folder on their own filesystem rather than in a vendor's cloud.
read the full Bruno overview →
About php-vcr
php vcr is an MIT licensed PHP library that records a test suite's HTTP interactions into cassette files and replays them on later runs, giving PHPUnit style projects fast, deterministic tests that do not touch the live network.
read the full php-vcr overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Bruno or php-vcr more popular?
Bruno has 47,022 GitHub stars and php-vcr has 1,212. Bruno has the larger community by that measure.
Are Bruno and php-vcr free?
Both are open source. Bruno is licensed under MIT and php-vcr under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Bruno and php-vcr?
Bruno is written in JavaScript and php-vcr 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, Bruno or php-vcr?
Choose Bruno if you want the larger community (47,022 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose php-vcr if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.