head to head · open source
calibre vs ebooklib
calibre has 26,327 GitHub stars, 2,743 forks, 6 open issues and last shipped yesterday. ebooklib has 1,820 stars, 269 forks, 110 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. calibre leads on adoption by 1,347% (26,327 vs 1,820 stars). calibre is written in Python under GPL-3.0; ebooklib is written in Python under AGPL-3.0. calibre has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, ebooklib 15%. calibre was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (epub, python), 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
| calibre | ebooklib | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 26K | ★ 1.8K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Python | Python |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-01 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.7K | ⑂ 269 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick calibre if
- You weight community size — 26K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick ebooklib if
- You want the ebooklib feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and ebooklib fits your workflow better
About calibre
calibre calibre is an e book manager. It can view, convert, edit and catalog e books in all of the major e book formats. It can also talk to e book reader devices. It can go out to the internet and fetch metadata for your books. It can download newspapers and convert them into e books for convenient reading. It is cross platform, running on Linux, Windows and macOS. For more information, see the calibre About page. Screenshots Screenshots page Usage See the User Manual. Development Setting up a development environment for calibre. A tarball of the source code for the current calibre release. Bugs Bug reports and…
read the full calibre overview →
About ebooklib
About EbookLib EbookLib is a Python library for managing EPUB2/EPUB3. It's capable of reading and writing EPUB files programmatically. Heads up! EbookLib 0.20 was the final version supporting Python 2.7. Starting with the next release EbookLib requires Python 3.10+, has no dependency on six anymore and ships with type annotations. Want to contribute? It's easy! We welcome bug reports, suggestions, and Pull Requests. Before submitting a Pull Request, please take a quick look at our simple guidelines. Our contribution process is straightforward, with no special procedures to worry about. The API is designed to be…
read the full ebooklib overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is calibre or ebooklib more popular?
calibre has 26,327 GitHub stars and ebooklib has 1,820. calibre has the larger community by that measure.
Are calibre and ebooklib free?
Both are open source. calibre is licensed under GPL-3.0 and ebooklib under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between calibre and ebooklib?
calibre is written in Python and ebooklib in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, calibre or ebooklib?
Choose calibre if you want the larger community (26,327 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose ebooklib if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.