head to head · open source
headroom vs code2prompt
headroom has 73,130 GitHub stars, 5,624 forks, 643 open issues and last shipped yesterday. code2prompt has 7,677 stars, 446 forks, 16 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. headroom leads on adoption by 853% (73,130 vs 7,677 stars). headroom is written in Python under Apache-2.0; code2prompt is written in Rust under MIT. headroom has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, code2prompt 6%. headroom was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (ai, llm), 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
| headroom | code2prompt | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 73K | ★ 7.7K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Python | Rust |
| Last push | 2026-09-19 | 2026-09-18 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.6K | ⑂ 446 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick headroom if
- You weight community size — 73K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick code2prompt if
- You want the code2prompt feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You evaluated both and code2prompt fits your workflow better
About headroom
Headroom is an Apache 2.0 Python library, local proxy, agent wrapper and MCP server that compresses tool outputs, logs, files, RAG chunks and conversation history before they reach an LLM, and it is built for developers running AI coding agents or LLM applications who want to cut token usage without changing the answers they get.
read the full headroom overview →
About code2prompt
code2prompt is a Rust command line tool, also shipped as a Python SDK and an MCP server, that ingests a codebase and formats it into a single LLM prompt with a source tree, prompt templating, and token counting, for developers and agent builders who need to hand repository context to ChatGPT, Claude, or GPT.
read the full code2prompt overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is headroom or code2prompt more popular?
headroom has 73,130 GitHub stars and code2prompt has 7,677. headroom has the larger community by that measure.
Are headroom and code2prompt free?
Both are open source. headroom is licensed under Apache-2.0 and code2prompt under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between headroom and code2prompt?
headroom is written in Python and code2prompt in Rust. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, headroom or code2prompt?
Choose headroom if you want the larger community (73,130 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose code2prompt if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.