head to head · open source
filament vs wagtail
filament has 32,075 GitHub stars, 4,208 forks, 26 open issues and last shipped yesterday. wagtail has 20,503 stars, 4,608 forks, 1,007 open issues and last shipped yesterday. filament leads on adoption by 56% (32,075 vs 20,503 stars). filament is written in PHP under MIT; wagtail is written in Python under BSD-3-Clause. filament has attracted 13% as many forks as stars, wagtail 22%. wagtail was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (cms), 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
| filament | wagtail | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 32K | ★ 21K |
| License | MIT | BSD-3-Clause |
| Written in | PHP | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 4.2K | ⑂ 4.6K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick filament if
- You weight community size — 32K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick wagtail if
- You want the wagtail feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the BSD-3-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and wagtail fits your workflow better
About filament
Filament is a free, MIT licensed UI framework for Laravel, built on Livewire, that gives PHP developers a cohesive set of components for building applications and admin panels quickly.
read the full filament overview →
About wagtail
Wagtail is an open source content management system built on Django, for developers, designers and editors who need a fast authoring interface alongside precise control over front end design and content structure.
read the full wagtail overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is filament or wagtail more popular?
filament has 32,075 GitHub stars and wagtail has 20,503. filament has the larger community by that measure.
Are filament and wagtail free?
Both are open source. filament is licensed under MIT and wagtail under BSD-3-Clause. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between filament and wagtail?
filament is written in PHP and wagtail 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, filament or wagtail?
Choose filament if you want the larger community (32,075 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose wagtail if its feature set, stack or BSD-3-Clause licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.