head to head · open source
devpod vs sidex
devpod has 15,231 GitHub stars, 584 forks, 58 open issues and last shipped 10 months ago. sidex has 2,985 stars, 242 forks, 50 open issues and last shipped 27 days ago. devpod leads on adoption by 410% (15,231 vs 2,985 stars). devpod is written in Go under MPL-2.0; sidex is written in TypeScript under MIT. devpod has attracted 4% as many forks as stars, sidex 8%. sidex was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (ide, vscode), 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.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| devpod | sidex | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 15K | ★ 3.0K |
| License | MPL-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Go | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2025-11-14 | 2026-08-26 |
| Forks | ⑂ 584 | ⑂ 242 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick devpod if
- You weight community size — 15K stars and counting
- You want the MPL-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick sidex if
- You want the sidex feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and sidex fits your workflow better
About devpod
DevPod is an open source, client only tool that builds reproducible developer environments from a devcontainer.json on almost any backend — a local Docker daemon, a Kubernetes cluster, a reachable remote machine, or a virtual machine in the cloud — for developers who want a Codespaces style workflow without a hosted service.
read the full devpod overview →
About sidex
SideX is a port of Visual Studio Code that replaces Electron with Tauri — a Rust backend running against the operating system's native webview — for developers who want the VS Code workbench, editor, terminal and Git tooling without the bundled browser that normally comes with them.
read the full sidex overview →
More in Developer Tools
Related comparisons
More IDEs & Code Editors projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the IDEs & Code Editors field.
Frequently asked questions
Is devpod or sidex more popular?
devpod has 15,231 GitHub stars and sidex has 2,985. devpod has the larger community by that measure.
Are devpod and sidex free?
Both are open source. devpod is licensed under MPL-2.0 and sidex under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between devpod and sidex?
devpod is written in Go and sidex in TypeScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, devpod or sidex?
Choose devpod if you want the larger community (15,231 stars) or its MPL-2.0 licence terms. Choose sidex if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.