head to head · open source
esbuild vs cloud-in-a-bottle
esbuild has 40,063 GitHub stars, 1,346 forks, 622 open issues and last shipped 1 months ago. cloud-in-a-bottle has 1,177 stars, 77 forks, 17 open issues and last shipped yesterday. esbuild leads on adoption by 3,304% (40,063 vs 1,177 stars). esbuild is written in Go under MIT; cloud-in-a-bottle is written in Python under AGPL-3.0. esbuild has attracted 3% as many forks as stars, cloud-in-a-bottle 7%. cloud-in-a-bottle was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
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
| esbuild | cloud-in-a-bottle | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 40K | ★ 1.2K |
| License | MIT | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Go | Python |
| Last push | 2026-08-09 | 2026-09-19 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.3K | ⑂ 77 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick esbuild if
- You weight community size — 40K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick cloud-in-a-bottle if
- You want the cloud-in-a-bottle feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and cloud-in-a-bottle fits your workflow better
About esbuild
esbuild is an MIT licensed, Go based bundler for the web that compiles JavaScript, CSS, TypeScript, and JSX in one tool, aimed at front end developers and teams whose current web build pipelines are slower than they need to be.
read the full esbuild overview →
About cloud-in-a-bottle
Cloud in a Bottle is an AGPL 3.0, Python based platform that deploys, runs, and shares web apps on a server you control, so your apps, data, and infrastructure stay yours.
read the full cloud-in-a-bottle overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is esbuild or cloud-in-a-bottle more popular?
esbuild has 40,063 GitHub stars and cloud-in-a-bottle has 1,177. esbuild has the larger community by that measure.
Are esbuild and cloud-in-a-bottle free?
Both are open source. esbuild is licensed under MIT and cloud-in-a-bottle under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between esbuild and cloud-in-a-bottle?
esbuild is written in Go and cloud-in-a-bottle in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, esbuild or cloud-in-a-bottle?
Choose esbuild if you want the larger community (40,063 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose cloud-in-a-bottle if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.