head to head · open source
Docs vs jsdoc
Docs has 16,963 GitHub stars, 688 forks, 370 open issues and last shipped yesterday. jsdoc has 15,471 stars, 1,493 forks, 459 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Docs leads on adoption by 10% (16,963 vs 15,471 stars). Docs is written in TypeScript under MIT; jsdoc is written in JavaScript under Apache-2.0. Docs has attracted 4% as many forks as stars, jsdoc 10%. Docs was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (documentation), 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
| Docs | jsdoc | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 17K | ★ 15K |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | JavaScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 688 | ⑂ 1.5K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Docs if
- You weight community size — 17K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick jsdoc if
- You want the jsdoc feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You evaluated both and jsdoc fits your workflow better
About Docs
Chat on Matrix • Documentation • Try Docs • Contact us La Suite Docs: Collaborative Text Editing Docs, where your notes can become knowledge through live collaboration. Docs is an open source collaborative editor that helps teams write, organize, and share knowledge together in real time. What is Docs? Docs is an open source alternative to tools like Notion or Google Docs, focused on: Real time collaboration Clean, structured documents Knowledge organization Data ownership & self hosting Built for public organizations, companies, and open communities. Why use Docs? Writing Rich text & Markdown editing Slash…
About jsdoc
JSDoc An API documentation generator for JavaScript. Want to contribute to JSDoc? Please read CONTRIBUTING.md . Installation and Usage JSDoc supports stable versions of Node.js 8.15.0 and later. You can install JSDoc globally or in your project's node modules folder. To install the latest version on npm globally (might require sudo ; learn how to fix this): npm install g jsdoc To install the latest version on npm locally and save it in your package's package.json file: npm install save dev jsdoc Note : By default, npm adds your package using the caret operator in front of the version number (for example, ^3.6.3…
read the full jsdoc overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Docs or jsdoc more popular?
Docs has 16,963 GitHub stars and jsdoc has 15,471. Docs has the larger community by that measure.
Are Docs and jsdoc free?
Both are open source. Docs is licensed under MIT and jsdoc under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Docs and jsdoc?
Docs is written in TypeScript and jsdoc in JavaScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Docs or jsdoc?
Choose Docs if you want the larger community (16,963 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose jsdoc if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.