head to head · open source
effect vs gf
effect has 17,464 GitHub stars, 892 forks, 253 open issues and last shipped yesterday. gf has 13,294 stars, 1,731 forks, 148 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. effect leads on adoption by 31% (17,464 vs 13,294 stars). effect is written in TypeScript under MIT; gf is written in Go under MIT. effect has attracted 5% as many forks as stars, gf 13%. effect was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (opentelemetry), 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
| effect | gf | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 17K | ★ 13K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-10-30 |
| Forks | ⑂ 892 | ⑂ 1.7K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick effect 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 gf if
- You want the gf feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and gf fits your workflow better
About effect
Effect Effect is a library for building robust, maintainable, type safe, and production grade applications in TypeScript. It helps you handle the hard problems at scale: typed errors, dependency injection, structured concurrency, scheduling, tracing, and unified schema validation. Effect V4 is currently a release candidate. The main branch contains v4 development. Install V4 RC Requirements TypeScript 5.9 or newer. TypeScript 7 is recommended for the best performance and compatibility with Effect's TypeScript tooling. Node.js 18 or newer is the general minimum for running Effect on Node.js. Some integration…
read the full effect overview →
About gf
English 简体中文 GoFrame is a powerful framework for faster, easier, and more efficient project development. Use it as a full application framework, or pick individual components as needed. Installation GoFrame requires Go 1.23 or later. In an existing module, add the framework: Install the gf CLI: Usage Create main.go : Run it: Open To scaffold a project with the gf CLI: Documentation Official Site: Official Site(en): 国内镜像： Mirror Site: Mirror Site: Offline Docs GoDoc API: Doc Source: Contributors 💖 Thanks to all the contributors who made GoFrame possible 💖 License GoFrame is licensed under the MIT License, 100%…
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Frequently asked questions
Is effect or gf more popular?
effect has 17,464 GitHub stars and gf has 13,294. effect has the larger community by that measure.
Are effect and gf free?
Both are open source. effect is licensed under MIT and gf under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between effect and gf?
effect is written in TypeScript and gf 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, effect or gf?
Choose effect if you want the larger community (17,464 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose gf if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.