head to head · open source
Docuseal vs pdfcraft
Docuseal has 18,671 GitHub stars, 1,884 forks, 121 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. pdfcraft has 2,684 stars, 903 forks, 68 open issues and last shipped today. Docuseal leads on adoption by 596% (18,671 vs 2,684 stars). Docuseal is written in Ruby under AGPL-3.0; pdfcraft is written in Rust under Apache-2.0. Docuseal has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, pdfcraft 34%. pdfcraft was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (documents, pdf), 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
| Docuseal | pdfcraft | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 19K | ★ 2.7K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Ruby | Rust |
| Last push | 2026-10-05 | 2026-10-08 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.9K | ⑂ 903 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Docuseal if
- You weight community size — 19K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Ruby
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick pdfcraft if
- You want the pdfcraft feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You evaluated both and pdfcraft fits your workflow better
About Docuseal
Docuseal is an open source document filling and signing platform for individuals and teams, and its repository describes it as an open source alternative to DocuSign. It is built in Ruby on Rails and uses a self hosted deployment model, with interface components associated with Tailwind CSS, Vue, and Hotwire Turbo.
read the full Docuseal overview →
About pdfcraft
PdfCraft is an open source, clean room reimplementation of Adobe Acrobat built in pure Rust, aimed at anyone who wants a fast native tool to read, organize, secure and edit PDFs without an account or a cloud connection.
read the full pdfcraft overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Docuseal or pdfcraft more popular?
Docuseal has 18,671 GitHub stars and pdfcraft has 2,684. Docuseal has the larger community by that measure.
Are Docuseal and pdfcraft free?
Both are open source. Docuseal is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and pdfcraft under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Docuseal and pdfcraft?
Docuseal is written in Ruby and pdfcraft in Rust. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Docuseal or pdfcraft?
Choose Docuseal if you want the larger community (18,671 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose pdfcraft if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.