head to head · open source
claude-mem vs LightRAG
claude-mem has 110,572 GitHub stars, 9,645 forks, 186 open issues and last shipped yesterday. LightRAG has 40,487 stars, 5,752 forks, 222 open issues and last shipped 5 days ago. claude-mem leads on adoption by 173% (110,572 vs 40,487 stars). claude-mem is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; LightRAG is written in Python under MIT. claude-mem has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, LightRAG 14%. claude-mem 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
| claude-mem | LightRAG | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 111K | ★ 40K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Python |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-10-29 |
| Forks | ⑂ 9.6K | ⑂ 5.8K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick claude-mem if
- You weight community size — 111K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick LightRAG if
- You want the LightRAG feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and LightRAG fits your workflow better
About claude-mem
Claude Mem is now Grok Mem. The package is still claude mem . 🇨🇳 中文 • 🇹🇼 繁體中文 • 🇯🇵 日本語 • 🇵🇹 Português • 🇧🇷 Português • 🇰🇷 한국어 • 🇪🇸 Español • 🇩🇪 Deutsch • 🇫🇷 Français • 🇮🇱 עברית • 🇸🇦 العربية • 🇷🇺 Русский • 🇵🇱 Polski • 🇨🇿 Čeština • 🇳🇱 Nederlands • 🇹🇷 Türkçe • 🇺🇦 Українська • 🇻🇳 Tiếng Việt • 🇵🇭 Tagalog • 🇮🇩 Indonesia • 🇹🇭 ไทย • 🇮🇳 हिन्दी • 🇧🇩 বাংলা • 🇵🇰 اردو • 🇷🇴 Română • 🇸🇪 Svenska • 🇮🇹 Italiano • 🇬🇷 Ελληνικά • 🇭🇺 Magyar • 🇫🇮 Suomi • 🇩🇰 Dansk • 🇳🇴 Norsk Grok Mem is how Grok Bots remember. Sits next to Grok's own memory. Does not replace it. Quick…
read the full claude-mem overview →
About LightRAG
🚀 LightRAG: Simple and Fast Retrieval Augmented Generation 🎉 News [2026.07]🎯[New Feature]: Add Smart Heading recognition feature for word documents. [2026.05]🎯[New Feature]: Merge RagAnything into LightRAG 🎉. Multimodal content parsing and extraction via MinerU / Docling services. [2026.05]🎯[New Feature]: Introducing four selectable text chunking strategies: Fix , Recursive , Vector , and Paragraph . [2026.05]🎯[New Feature]: Role specific LLM configuration support, 4 distinct roles: EXTRACT, QUERY, KEYWORDS, and VLM, with independent LLM settings. [2026.03]🎯[New Feature]: Integrated OpenSearch as a…
read the full LightRAG overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is claude-mem or LightRAG more popular?
claude-mem has 110,572 GitHub stars and LightRAG has 40,487. claude-mem has the larger community by that measure.
Are claude-mem and LightRAG free?
Both are open source. claude-mem is licensed under Apache-2.0 and LightRAG under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between claude-mem and LightRAG?
claude-mem is written in TypeScript and LightRAG 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, claude-mem or LightRAG?
Choose claude-mem if you want the larger community (110,572 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose LightRAG if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.