head to head · open source
Fathom Lite vs shynet
Fathom Lite has 8,034 GitHub stars, 388 forks, 5 open issues and last shipped 8 months ago. shynet has 3,157 stars, 212 forks, 63 open issues and last shipped 8 months ago. Fathom Lite leads on adoption by 154% (8,034 vs 3,157 stars). Fathom Lite is written in Go under MIT; shynet is written in Python under Apache-2.0. Fathom Lite has attracted 5% as many forks as stars, shynet 7%. Fathom Lite was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (analytics, privacy), 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
| Fathom Lite | shynet | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 8.0K | ★ 3.2K |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Python |
| Last push | 2026-03-18 | 2026-03-15 |
| Forks | ⑂ 388 | ⑂ 212 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Fathom Lite if
- You weight community size — 8.0K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick shynet if
- You want the shynet feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and shynet fits your workflow better
About Fathom Lite
Fathom Lite simple website analytics ============================== Fathom Lite is a previous and open source version of Fathom Analytics (a paid, hosted Google Analytics alternative). It was the very first version of our software, and has been downloaded millions of times! While we are no longer adding features to this Lite version, we will be continuing to maintain it long term and fix any bugs that come up. Fathom Lite vs Fathom (hosted) Today’s Fathom Analytics is a hosted product with simple pricing based on monthly pageviews. The same core capabilities are included on every plan: for example API access, up…
read the full Fathom Lite overview →
About shynet
Modern, privacy friendly, and cookie free web analytics. Getting started » Screenshots • Features • Office Hours Motivation There are a lot of web analytics tools. Unfortunately, most of them come with the following caveats: They require handing all of your visitors' info to a third party company They use cookies to track visitors across sessions, so you need to have those annoying cookie notices They collect so much personal data that even the NSA is jealous They are closed source and/or expensive, often with limited data portability They are hard to use Shynet has none of these caveats. You host it…
read the full shynet overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Fathom Lite or shynet more popular?
Fathom Lite has 8,034 GitHub stars and shynet has 3,157. Fathom Lite has the larger community by that measure.
Are Fathom Lite and shynet free?
Both are open source. Fathom Lite is licensed under MIT and shynet under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Fathom Lite and shynet?
Fathom Lite is written in Go and shynet 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, Fathom Lite or shynet?
Choose Fathom Lite if you want the larger community (8,034 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose shynet if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.