head to head · open source
giscus vs Artalk
giscus has 12,110 GitHub stars, 481 forks, 127 open issues and last shipped 4 months ago. Artalk has 2,336 stars, 208 forks, 108 open issues and last shipped 7 days ago. giscus leads on adoption by 418% (12,110 vs 2,336 stars). giscus is written in TypeScript under MIT; Artalk is written in Go under MIT. giscus has attracted 4% as many forks as stars, Artalk 9%. Artalk was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 5 topic tags (blog, comment-system, comments, comments-widget), 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
| giscus | Artalk | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 12K | ★ 2.3K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-05-26 | 2026-09-11 |
| Forks | ⑂ 481 | ⑂ 208 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick giscus if
- You weight community size — 12K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Artalk if
- You want the Artalk feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and Artalk fits your workflow better
About giscus
giscus is an open source, MIT licensed commenting system powered by GitHub Discussions that lets visitors leave comments and reactions on a website through their existing GitHub accounts.
read the full giscus overview →
About Artalk
Artalk is an open source, self hosted comment system written in Go and released under the MIT license. It is intended for blogs, websites, and web applications that need a comment widget under the site owner’s control. The project is categorized as community and social software, and its topics include blog, comment system, comments widget, go, golang, messenger, react, and self hosted.
read the full Artalk overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is giscus or Artalk more popular?
giscus has 12,110 GitHub stars and Artalk has 2,336. giscus has the larger community by that measure.
Are giscus and Artalk free?
Both are open source. giscus is licensed under MIT and Artalk under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between giscus and Artalk?
giscus is written in TypeScript and Artalk 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, giscus or Artalk?
Choose giscus if you want the larger community (12,110 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose Artalk if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.