head to head · open source
Hoppscotch vs emissary
Hoppscotch has 80,331 GitHub stars, 6,110 forks, 820 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. emissary has 4,523 stars, 708 forks, 442 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Hoppscotch leads on adoption by 1,676% (80,331 vs 4,523 stars). Hoppscotch is written in TypeScript under MIT; emissary is written in Python under Apache-2.0. Hoppscotch has attracted 8% as many forks as stars, emissary 16%. emissary 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.
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Side by side
| Hoppscotch | emissary | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 80K | ★ 4.5K |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-16 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.1K | ⑂ 708 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Hoppscotch if
- You weight community size — 80K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick emissary if
- You want the emissary 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 emissary fits your workflow better
About Hoppscotch
Hoppscotch is an open source API development ecosystem that provides a full featured client for designing, testing, and documenting APIs. It operates as a web based application, desktop app, and CLI tool, supporting offline, on premises, and cloud deployments. Built with TypeScript and licensed under MIT, it serves as a direct open source alternative to proprietary tools like Postman and Insomnia.
read the full Hoppscotch overview →
About emissary
Emissary ingress is an open source Kubernetes native API gateway, Layer 7 load balancer, and Kubernetes Ingress built on the Envoy Proxy. The project is written in Python, distributed under the Apache 2.0 license, and is a CNCF incubation project formerly known as Ambassador API Gateway. It lives in the cloud native ecosystem and targets microservice platforms that already use Kubernetes for scaling and resiliency.
read the full emissary overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Hoppscotch or emissary more popular?
Hoppscotch has 80,331 GitHub stars and emissary has 4,523. Hoppscotch has the larger community by that measure.
Are Hoppscotch and emissary free?
Both are open source. Hoppscotch is licensed under MIT and emissary under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Hoppscotch and emissary?
Hoppscotch is written in TypeScript and emissary 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, Hoppscotch or emissary?
Choose Hoppscotch if you want the larger community (80,331 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose emissary if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.