head to head · open source
frigate vs unifi-mcp
frigate has 37,160 GitHub stars, 3,782 forks, 95 open issues and last shipped yesterday. unifi-mcp has 986 stars, 133 forks, 22 open issues and last shipped yesterday. frigate leads on adoption by 3,669% (37,160 vs 986 stars). frigate is written in Python under MIT; unifi-mcp is written in Python under MIT. frigate has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, unifi-mcp 13%. frigate was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (home-automation), 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
| frigate | unifi-mcp | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 37K | ★ 986 |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | Python | Python |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.8K | ⑂ 133 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick frigate if
- You weight community size — 37K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick unifi-mcp if
- You want the unifi-mcp feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and unifi-mcp fits your workflow better
About frigate
Frigate NVR™ Realtime Object Detection for IP Cameras \[English\] 简体中文 A complete and local NVR designed for Home Assistant with AI object detection. Uses OpenCV and Tensorflow to perform realtime object detection locally for IP cameras. Use of a GPU or AI accelerator is highly recommended. AI accelerators will outperform even the best CPUs with very little overhead. See Frigate's supported object detectors. Tight integration with Home Assistant via a custom component Designed to minimize resource use and maximize performance by only looking for objects when and where it is necessary Leverages multiprocessing…
read the full frigate overview →
About unifi-mcp
UniFi MCP Leverage agents and agentic AI workflows to manage your UniFi deployment. Servers Cloud Relay Cloud Relay pairs the Cloudflare hosted Worker gateway with the Relay sidecar on your LAN. The Worker provides the authenticated edge MCP endpoint, Durable Object broker, multi location routing, token boundary, and deployment/management CLI. The Relay sidecar is a local MCP HTTP client and forwarder: it discovers configured local MCP servers over HTTP and maintains an outbound WebSocket to the Worker. Remote requests follow MCP client → Worker gateway → outbound WebSocket → Relay sidecar → local MCP servers…
read the full unifi-mcp overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is frigate or unifi-mcp more popular?
frigate has 37,160 GitHub stars and unifi-mcp has 986. frigate has the larger community by that measure.
Are frigate and unifi-mcp free?
Both are open source. frigate is licensed under MIT and unifi-mcp under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between frigate and unifi-mcp?
frigate is written in Python and unifi-mcp 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, frigate or unifi-mcp?
Choose frigate if you want the larger community (37,160 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose unifi-mcp if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.