head to head · open source
hugo vs Instatic
hugo has 89,854 GitHub stars, 8,381 forks, 235 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Instatic has 8,691 stars, 802 forks, 134 open issues and last shipped 5 days ago. hugo leads on adoption by 934% (89,854 vs 8,691 stars). hugo is written in Go under Apache-2.0; Instatic is written in TypeScript under MIT. hugo has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, Instatic 9%. hugo was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (cms), 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
| hugo | Instatic | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 90K | ★ 8.7K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Go | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-13 |
| Forks | ⑂ 8.4K | ⑂ 802 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick hugo if
- You weight community size — 90K 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 Instatic if
- You want the Instatic feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and Instatic fits your workflow better
About hugo
Hugo is a static site generator written in Go that renders a complete site in seconds, often less, and it is aimed at developers, technical writers, and content teams who build blogs, documentation sites, portfolios, landing pages, and corporate sites as static files.
About Instatic
Instatic is an MIT licensed, TypeScript built visual CMS that lets designers, developers, and small teams self host their entire website stack — editor, content engine, and publisher — on a single Bun server and publish clean static pages.
read the full Instatic overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is hugo or Instatic more popular?
hugo has 89,854 GitHub stars and Instatic has 8,691. hugo has the larger community by that measure.
Are hugo and Instatic free?
Both are open source. hugo is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Instatic under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between hugo and Instatic?
hugo is written in Go and Instatic in TypeScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, hugo or Instatic?
Choose hugo if you want the larger community (89,854 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose Instatic if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.