head to head · open source
flowable-engine vs hof
flowable-engine has 9,542 GitHub stars, 2,890 forks, 411 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. hof has 613 stars, 48 forks, 74 open issues and last shipped 5 months ago. flowable-engine leads on adoption by 1,457% (9,542 vs 613 stars). flowable-engine is written in Java under Apache-2.0; hof is written in Go under Apache-2.0. flowable-engine has attracted 30% as many forks as stars, hof 8%. flowable-engine was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (workflow-engine), 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
| flowable-engine | hof | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 9.5K | ★ 613 |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Java | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-05-05 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.9K | ⑂ 48 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick flowable-engine if
- You weight community size — 9.5K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick hof if
- You want the hof feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and hof fits your workflow better
About flowable-engine
Flowable is an open source workflow and Business Process Management platform written in Java and distributed under the Apache 2.0 license. It bundles three engines in one project: a BPMN process engine, a CMMN case engine, and a DMN rule engine. The project lives in the Java ecosystem, integrates with Spring, and exposes both a Java API and a REST API for orchestrating human or system activities.
read the full flowable-engine overview →
About hof
hof is an Apache 2.0 licensed, Go based command line framework and TUI that unifies CUE schemas, data models, deterministic and agentic code generation, and a DAG task engine into a single developer experience for engineers who want one declarative source of truth across their toolchain.
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Frequently asked questions
Is flowable-engine or hof more popular?
flowable-engine has 9,542 GitHub stars and hof has 613. flowable-engine has the larger community by that measure.
Are flowable-engine and hof free?
Both are open source. flowable-engine is licensed under Apache-2.0 and hof under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between flowable-engine and hof?
flowable-engine is written in Java and hof 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, flowable-engine or hof?
Choose flowable-engine if you want the larger community (9,542 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose hof if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.