head to head · open source
Harness vs paasta
Harness has 38,378 GitHub stars, 3,397 forks, 106 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. paasta has 1,731 stars, 251 forks, 112 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Harness leads on adoption by 2,117% (38,378 vs 1,731 stars). Harness is written in Go under Apache-2.0; paasta is written in Python under Apache-2.0. Harness has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, paasta 15%. paasta was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (docker), 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
| Harness | paasta | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 38K | ★ 1.7K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Go | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-16 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.4K | ⑂ 251 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Harness if
- You weight community size — 38K 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 paasta if
- You want the paasta feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and paasta fits your workflow better
About Harness
Harness Open Source is an Apache 2.0, Go based developer platform that combines Git source control management, CI/CD pipelines, Gitspaces hosted development environments and artifact registries into one self hostable system for engineering teams that want end to end software delivery without stitching four separate products together.
read the full Harness overview →
About paasta
PaaSTA is an open source, distributed platform as a service written in Python and released under the Apache 2.0 license. It lives in the Kubernetes and Docker infrastructure ecosystem, and it was originally designed for Apache Mesos before being updated to use Kubernetes.
read the full paasta overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Harness or paasta more popular?
Harness has 38,378 GitHub stars and paasta has 1,731. Harness has the larger community by that measure.
Are Harness and paasta free?
Both are open source. Harness is licensed under Apache-2.0 and paasta under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Harness and paasta?
Harness is written in Go and paasta in Python. 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 paasta?
Choose Harness if you want the larger community (38,378 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose paasta if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.