head to head · open source
headroom vs holmesgpt
headroom has 73,130 GitHub stars, 5,624 forks, 643 open issues and last shipped yesterday. holmesgpt has 3,416 stars, 497 forks, 432 open issues and last shipped today. headroom leads on adoption by 2,041% (73,130 vs 3,416 stars). headroom is written in Python under Apache-2.0; holmesgpt is written in Python under Apache-2.0. headroom has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, holmesgpt 15%. holmesgpt was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (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 | holmesgpt | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 73K | ★ 3.4K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Python | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-19 | 2026-09-20 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.6K | ⑂ 497 |
| 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 holmesgpt if
- You want the holmesgpt 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 holmesgpt 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 holmesgpt
HolmesGPT is an open source site reliability engineering agent for production incident investigation. It is a CNCF Sandbox project written in Python under Apache 2.0. It lives in the cloud native DevOps and observability ecosystem, and it works with Kubernetes, VMs, cloud providers, databases, and SaaS platforms.
read the full holmesgpt overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is headroom or holmesgpt more popular?
headroom has 73,130 GitHub stars and holmesgpt has 3,416. headroom has the larger community by that measure.
Are headroom and holmesgpt free?
Both are open source. headroom is licensed under Apache-2.0 and holmesgpt under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between headroom and holmesgpt?
headroom is written in Python and holmesgpt 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, headroom or holmesgpt?
Choose headroom if you want the larger community (73,130 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose holmesgpt if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.