head to head · open source
fastapi vs Ocelot
fastapi has 102,402 GitHub stars, 9,903 forks, 78 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. Ocelot has 8,715 stars, 1,683 forks, 57 open issues and last shipped yesterday. fastapi leads on adoption by 1,075% (102,402 vs 8,715 stars). fastapi is written in Python under MIT; Ocelot is written in C# under MIT. fastapi has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, Ocelot 19%. Ocelot 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
| fastapi | Ocelot | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 102K | ★ 8.7K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | Python | C# |
| Last push | 2026-09-14 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 9.9K | ⑂ 1.7K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick fastapi if
- You weight community size — 102K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Ocelot if
- You want the Ocelot feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches C#
- You evaluated both and Ocelot fits your workflow better
About fastapi
FastAPI is an MIT licensed, high performance Python web framework for building APIs with standard Python type hints, aimed at Python developers and teams that need production ready HTTP services with automatic OpenAPI documentation.
read the full fastapi overview →
About Ocelot
Ocelot is a .NET API gateway built as a series of ASP.NET Core middlewares arranged in a specific order. It is aimed at teams running a microservices or service oriented architecture on .NET that need a unified point of entry into their system, though the README notes it will work with anything that speaks HTTP(S) and runs on any platform that ASP.NET Core supports. The project lives in the .NET ecosystem, is written in C , and is distributed under the MIT license.
read the full Ocelot overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is fastapi or Ocelot more popular?
fastapi has 102,402 GitHub stars and Ocelot has 8,715. fastapi has the larger community by that measure.
Are fastapi and Ocelot free?
Both are open source. fastapi is licensed under MIT and Ocelot under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between fastapi and Ocelot?
fastapi is written in Python and Ocelot in C#. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, fastapi or Ocelot?
Choose fastapi if you want the larger community (102,402 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose Ocelot if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.