head to head · open source
halo vs Umbraco-CMS
halo has 39,797 GitHub stars, 10,329 forks, 112 open issues and last shipped today. Umbraco-CMS has 5,251 stars, 2,922 forks, 525 open issues and last shipped yesterday. halo leads on adoption by 658% (39,797 vs 5,251 stars). halo is written in Java under GPL-3.0; Umbraco-CMS is written in C# under MIT. halo has attracted 26% as many forks as stars, Umbraco-CMS 56%. halo 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
| halo | Umbraco-CMS | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 40K | ★ 5.3K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Java | C# |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 10K | ⑂ 2.9K |
| 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 Umbraco-CMS if
- You want the Umbraco-CMS feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches C#
- You evaluated both and Umbraco-CMS 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 Umbraco-CMS
Umbraco CMS is a free and open source .NET content management system, released under the MIT licence, for .NET developers and editorial teams who need to build and operate content managed websites on infrastructure they control.
read the full Umbraco-CMS overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is halo or Umbraco-CMS more popular?
halo has 39,797 GitHub stars and Umbraco-CMS has 5,251. halo has the larger community by that measure.
Are halo and Umbraco-CMS free?
Both are open source. halo is licensed under GPL-3.0 and Umbraco-CMS under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between halo and Umbraco-CMS?
halo is written in Java and Umbraco-CMS in C#. 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 Umbraco-CMS?
Choose halo if you want the larger community (39,797 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose Umbraco-CMS if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.