head to head · open source
ego-lite vs HackBrowserData
ego-lite has 16,117 GitHub stars, 844 forks, 169 open issues and last shipped yesterday. HackBrowserData has 14,534 stars, 1,810 forks, 33 open issues and last shipped 17 days ago. ego-lite leads on adoption by 11% (16,117 vs 14,534 stars). ego-lite is written in JavaScript under MIT; HackBrowserData is written in Go under MIT. ego-lite has attracted 5% as many forks as stars, HackBrowserData 12%. ego-lite was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (browser), 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
| ego-lite | HackBrowserData | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 16K | ★ 15K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | JavaScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-01 |
| Forks | ⑂ 844 | ⑂ 1.8K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick ego-lite if
- You weight community size — 16K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick HackBrowserData if
- You want the HackBrowserData feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and HackBrowserData fits your workflow better
About ego-lite
ego lite is an MIT licensed browser from citrolabs that lets a person and their AI agents drive the same browser in parallel, aimed at developers who want Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, or a custom agent CLI to automate real, logged in web pages without surrendering the tabs they are using.
read the full ego-lite overview →
About HackBrowserData
HackBrowserData is an MIT licensed command line tool written in Go that decrypts and exports browser data — passwords, cookies, history, bookmarks, credit cards, downloads, extensions, localStorage and sessionStorage — from Chromium based browsers, Firefox, and Safari for security research on Windows, macOS and Linux.
read the full HackBrowserData overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is ego-lite or HackBrowserData more popular?
ego-lite has 16,117 GitHub stars and HackBrowserData has 14,534. ego-lite has the larger community by that measure.
Are ego-lite and HackBrowserData free?
Both are open source. ego-lite is licensed under MIT and HackBrowserData under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between ego-lite and HackBrowserData?
ego-lite is written in JavaScript and HackBrowserData 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, ego-lite or HackBrowserData?
Choose ego-lite if you want the larger community (16,117 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose HackBrowserData if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.