head to head · open source
rancher vs flowable-engine
rancher has 25,924 GitHub stars, 3,221 forks, 3,371 open issues and last shipped yesterday. flowable-engine has 9,542 stars, 2,890 forks, 411 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. rancher leads on adoption by 172% (25,924 vs 9,542 stars). rancher is written in Go under Apache-2.0; flowable-engine is written in Java under Apache-2.0. rancher has attracted 12% as many forks as stars, flowable-engine 30%. rancher 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
| rancher | flowable-engine | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 26K | ★ 9.5K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Java |
| Last push | 2026-09-19 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.2K | ⑂ 2.9K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick rancher if
- You weight community size — 26K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick flowable-engine if
- You want the flowable-engine feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You evaluated both and flowable-engine fits your workflow better
About rancher
Rancher is an Apache 2.0 licensed, Go based open source container management platform for organizations that deploy containers in production and need to run Kubernetes everywhere while meeting IT requirements and empowering DevOps teams.
read the full rancher overview →
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 →
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Frequently asked questions
Is rancher or flowable-engine more popular?
rancher has 25,924 GitHub stars and flowable-engine has 9,542. rancher has the larger community by that measure.
Are rancher and flowable-engine free?
Both are open source. rancher is licensed under Apache-2.0 and flowable-engine under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between rancher and flowable-engine?
rancher is written in Go and flowable-engine in Java. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, rancher or flowable-engine?
Choose rancher if you want the larger community (25,924 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose flowable-engine if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.