head to head · open source
Harness vs bex
Harness has 38,798 GitHub stars, 3,451 forks, 106 open issues and last shipped yesterday. bex has 578 stars, 65 forks, 8 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Harness leads on adoption by 6,612% (38,798 vs 578 stars). Harness is written in Go under Apache-2.0; bex is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Harness has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, bex 11%. bex was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| Harness | bex | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 39K | ★ 578 |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.5K | ⑂ 65 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Harness if
- You weight community size — 39K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick bex if
- You want the bex feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and bex fits your workflow better
About Harness
Harness Harness Open Source is an open source development platform packed with the power of code hosting, automated DevOps pipelines, hosted development environments (Gitspaces), and artifact registries. Overview Harness Open source is an open source development platform packed with the power of code hosting, automated DevOps pipelines, Gitspaces, and artifact registries. Running Harness locally The latest publicly released docker image can be found on harness/harness. To install Harness yourself, simply run the command below. Once the container is up, you can visit in your browser. The Harness image uses a…
read the full Harness overview →
About bex
bex The open source, AI native alternative to Render. Deploy from Git to HTTPS on infrastructure you own—and give developers and coding agents the same first class control plane. Quickstart · Features · Screenshots · Architecture · Render parity · Contributing [!WARNING] bex is in active development and is not ready for production workloads. APIs and configuration can change. The core platform works and is continuously tested; use it today to explore, contribute, and help shape the project. Why bex Render, Heroku, and Railway proved the experience developers want: connect a repo, get a URL, and avoid operating…
More in Developer Tools
Related comparisons
More Build & Deployment projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Build & Deployment field.
Frequently asked questions
Is Harness or bex more popular?
Harness has 38,798 GitHub stars and bex has 578. Harness has the larger community by that measure.
Are Harness and bex free?
Both are open source. Harness is licensed under Apache-2.0 and bex under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Harness and bex?
Harness is written in Go and bex 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, Harness or bex?
Choose Harness if you want the larger community (38,798 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose bex if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.