head to head · open source
hugo vs nesta
hugo has 90,326 GitHub stars, 8,447 forks, 235 open issues and last shipped yesterday. nesta has 899 stars, 121 forks, 5 open issues and last shipped 4 months ago. hugo leads on adoption by 9,947% (90,326 vs 899 stars). hugo is written in Go under Apache-2.0; nesta is written in Ruby under MIT. hugo has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, nesta 13%. hugo was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (cms, static-site-generator), 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 | nesta | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 90K | ★ 899 |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Go | Ruby |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-06-23 |
| Forks | ⑂ 8.4K | ⑂ 121 |
| 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 nesta if
- You want the nesta feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Ruby
- You evaluated both and nesta fits your workflow better
About hugo
[Clang]: [GCC]: [Git]: [Go]: [bep]: [bugs]: [contributing]: CONTRIBUTING.md [create a proposal]: [dart sass]: [details]: [documentation repository]: [documentation]: [dragonfly bsd, freebsd, netbsd, and openbsd]: [features]: [forum]: [friends]: [hugo modules]: [installation]: [issue queue]: [linux]: [macos]: [prebuilt binary]: [requesting help]: [spf13]: [static site generator]: [support]: [themes]: [transpile sass to css]: [website]: [windows]: A fast and flexible static site generator built with love by [bep][], [spf13][], and [friends][] in Go. [Website][] [Installation][] [Documentation][] [Support][]…
About nesta
File Based CMS and Static Site Generator Nesta is a lightweight CMS for building content sites and blogs, written in Ruby using the [Sinatra] web framework. Write your content in [Markdown] or [Textile], in your text editor (drop into HTML or Haml if you need more control) Files are stored in text files on your hard drive (there is no database) Publish changes by putting these files online (Git recommended, not required) Deploy either as a static site (SSG) or by rendering HTML on the server (SSR) [Sinatra]: "Sinatra" [Markdown]: [Textile]: Installation Begin by [installing Ruby], then the Nesta gem: $ gem…
read the full nesta overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is hugo or nesta more popular?
hugo has 90,326 GitHub stars and nesta has 899. hugo has the larger community by that measure.
Are hugo and nesta free?
Both are open source. hugo is licensed under Apache-2.0 and nesta under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between hugo and nesta?
hugo is written in Go and nesta in Ruby. 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 nesta?
Choose hugo if you want the larger community (90,326 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose nesta if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.