head to head · open source
gradle vs wxt
gradle has 18,845 GitHub stars, 5,334 forks, 3,494 open issues and last shipped yesterday. wxt has 10,519 stars, 564 forks, 214 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. gradle leads on adoption by 79% (18,845 vs 10,519 stars). gradle is written in Groovy under Apache-2.0; wxt is written in TypeScript under MIT. gradle has attracted 28% as many forks as stars, wxt 5%. gradle was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (build-tool), 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
| gradle | wxt | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 19K | ★ 11K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Groovy | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-16 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.3K | ⑂ 564 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick gradle if
- You weight community size — 19K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Groovy
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick wxt if
- You want the wxt feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and wxt fits your workflow better
About gradle
Gradle is an open source build automation tool distributed under the Apache 2.0 license, hosted at gradle.org and developed in the Groovy language. It is described as a highly scalable build automation tool designed to handle everything from large, multi project enterprise builds to quick development tasks across various languages. Its modular, performance oriented architecture integrates with development environments, and the project has grown over roughly seventeen years to a repository with 18,841 stars, 5,335 forks, and 3,494 open issues. It lives in the JVM tooling ecosystem, with topics covering build tool,…
read the full gradle overview →
About wxt
WXT is a next generation framework for developing web extensions, written in TypeScript and published under the MIT license. It lives in the JavaScript and TypeScript ecosystem, distributed through npm as the wxt package, and its own description frames it as "like Nuxt, but for Web Extensions" — that is, a batteries included toolkit that turns extension development into a structured, conventional project layout rather than a pile of loose manifest files and hand wired build scripts. The project has been in development for roughly three years, carries about 10,500 stars and 564 forks on GitHub, and is maintained b…
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Frequently asked questions
Is gradle or wxt more popular?
gradle has 18,845 GitHub stars and wxt has 10,519. gradle has the larger community by that measure.
Are gradle and wxt free?
Both are open source. gradle is licensed under Apache-2.0 and wxt under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between gradle and wxt?
gradle is written in Groovy and wxt in TypeScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, gradle or wxt?
Choose gradle if you want the larger community (18,845 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose wxt if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.