head to head · open source
Ghost vs marmite
Ghost has 55,339 GitHub stars, 11,975 forks, 182 open issues and last shipped yesterday. marmite has 875 stars, 57 forks, 6 open issues and last shipped 13 days ago. Ghost leads on adoption by 6,224% (55,339 vs 875 stars). Ghost is written in TypeScript under MIT; marmite is written in Rust under AGPL-3.0. Ghost has attracted 22% as many forks as stars, marmite 7%. Ghost 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
| Ghost | marmite | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 55K | ★ 875 |
| License | MIT | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Rust |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-05 |
| Forks | ⑂ 12K | ⑂ 57 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Ghost if
- You weight community size — 55K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick marmite if
- You want the marmite feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You evaluated both and marmite fits your workflow better
About Ghost
Ghost is an open source publishing platform built in Node.js and TypeScript, designed for blogs, newsletters, and membership based content sites. It runs as a self hosted web application and also powers Ghost(Pro), a managed service where all revenue supports the Ghost Foundation. The project lives in the JavaScript/Node.js ecosystem and is licensed under MIT.
read the full Ghost overview →
About marmite
Marmite is a Rust static site generator for bloggers that turns a directory of Markdown files into a complete static HTML site with a single command, aimed at writers who want to publish chronological articles without assembling a build pipeline.
read the full marmite overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Ghost or marmite more popular?
Ghost has 55,339 GitHub stars and marmite has 875. Ghost has the larger community by that measure.
Are Ghost and marmite free?
Both are open source. Ghost is licensed under MIT and marmite under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Ghost and marmite?
Ghost is written in TypeScript and marmite in Rust. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Ghost or marmite?
Choose Ghost if you want the larger community (55,339 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose marmite if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.