head to head · open source
Ente vs certificates
Ente has 28,969 GitHub stars, 1,806 forks, 229 open issues and last shipped yesterday. certificates has 8,885 stars, 597 forks, 299 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. Ente leads on adoption by 226% (28,969 vs 8,885 stars). Ente is written in Dart under AGPL-3.0; certificates is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Ente has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, certificates 7%. Ente was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
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
| Ente | certificates | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 29K | ★ 8.9K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Dart | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-19 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.8K | ⑂ 597 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Ente if
- You weight community size — 29K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Dart
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick certificates if
- You want the certificates feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and certificates fits your workflow better
About Ente
Ente is a fully open source, end to end encrypted platform for storing photos, documents and credentials in the cloud, packaged as a monorepo of client apps and a server, and intended for people who want the features of Google Photos, Apple Photos and Authy without having to trust the service provider with their data.
About certificates
step ca is an open source online certificate authority that issues X.509 and SSH certificates and runs as an ACME server, built for DevOps teams that need automated certificate management without a commercial PKI contract.
read the full certificates overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Ente or certificates more popular?
Ente has 28,969 GitHub stars and certificates has 8,885. Ente has the larger community by that measure.
Are Ente and certificates free?
Both are open source. Ente is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and certificates under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Ente and certificates?
Ente is written in Dart and certificates in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Ente or certificates?
Choose Ente if you want the larger community (28,969 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose certificates if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.