head to head · open source
halo vs pagible
halo has 39,787 GitHub stars, 10,329 forks, 112 open issues and last shipped yesterday. pagible has 587 stars, 14 forks, 9 open issues and last shipped yesterday. halo leads on adoption by 6,678% (39,787 vs 587 stars). halo is written in Java under GPL-3.0; pagible is written in PHP under MIT. halo has attracted 26% as many forks as stars, pagible 2%. pagible was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (cms, content-management-system), 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
| halo | pagible | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 40K | ★ 587 |
| License | GPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Java | PHP |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 10K | ⑂ 14 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick halo if
- You weight community size — 40K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick pagible if
- You want the pagible feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You evaluated both and pagible fits your workflow better
About halo
Halo is an open source, Java based website building tool licensed under GPL 3.0 that lets individuals and teams publish and run a blog, knowledge base, corporate website, or online store from infrastructure they control.
About pagible
PagibleAI CMS is an MIT licensed, API first content management package for Laravel that installs into an existing PHP application and is aimed at Laravel teams that want WordPress like editing, Contentful style structured content, AI assistance, and multi tenant scale.
read the full pagible overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is halo or pagible more popular?
halo has 39,787 GitHub stars and pagible has 587. halo has the larger community by that measure.
Are halo and pagible free?
Both are open source. halo is licensed under GPL-3.0 and pagible under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between halo and pagible?
halo is written in Java and pagible in PHP. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, halo or pagible?
Choose halo if you want the larger community (39,787 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose pagible if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.