head to head · open source
conductor vs kala
conductor has 32,401 GitHub stars, 1,051 forks, 253 open issues and last shipped yesterday. kala has 2,155 stars, 191 forks, 15 open issues and last shipped 11 months ago. conductor leads on adoption by 1,404% (32,401 vs 2,155 stars). conductor is written in Java under Apache-2.0; kala is written in Go under MIT. conductor has attracted 3% as many forks as stars, kala 9%. conductor 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
| conductor | kala | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 32K | ★ 2.2K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Java | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2025-12-05 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.1K | ⑂ 191 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick conductor if
- You weight community size — 32K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick kala if
- You want the kala feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and kala fits your workflow better
About conductor
Conductor Durable Execution for Workflows and Agents Build agents that adapt. Run graphs that endure. Conductor is an open source durable execution platform for microservices, AI agents, and adaptive workflow graphs. It turns runtime choices—loops, branching, fan out, tool calls, approvals, retries, and cancellation—into durable, inspectable execution. It originated at Netflix and is actively maintained by Orkes and the community. Get Running in 60 Seconds Prerequisites: Node.js v16+ and Java 21+ must be installed. Open — your server is running with the built in ui next UI. Upgrading from a previous version? The…
read the full conductor overview →
About kala
Kala Kala is a simplistic, modern, and performant job scheduler written in Go. Features: Single binary No dependencies JSON over HTTP API Job Stats Configurable Retries Scheduling with ISO 8601 Date and Interval notation Dependent Jobs Persistent with several database drivers Web UI Note that it is not battle tested. Use at your own risk. Kala was inspired by the desire for a simpler Chronos (developed by Airbnb). Kala is Chronos for the rest of us. If you need fault tolerance, distributed features, massive scale, then I recommend checking out Chronos. This is designed to be the Chronos for start ups. Installing…
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Frequently asked questions
Is conductor or kala more popular?
conductor has 32,401 GitHub stars and kala has 2,155. conductor has the larger community by that measure.
Are conductor and kala free?
Both are open source. conductor is licensed under Apache-2.0 and kala under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between conductor and kala?
conductor is written in Java and kala 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, conductor or kala?
Choose conductor if you want the larger community (32,401 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose kala if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.