head to head · open source
Hyperswitch vs Crater
Hyperswitch has 43,615 GitHub stars, 5,137 forks, 2,185 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Crater has 8,348 stars, 1,711 forks, 425 open issues and last shipped 2.1 years ago. Hyperswitch leads on adoption by 422% (43,615 vs 8,348 stars). Hyperswitch is written in Rust under Apache-2.0; Crater is written in PHP under AGPL-3.0. Hyperswitch has attracted 12% as many forks as stars, Crater 20%. Hyperswitch was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (payment), 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
| Hyperswitch | Crater | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 44K | ★ 8.3K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Rust | PHP |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2024-08-10 |
| Forks | ⑂ 5.1K | ⑂ 1.7K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Hyperswitch if
- You weight community size — 44K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Rust
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Crater if
- You want the Crater feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You evaluated both and Crater fits your workflow better
About Hyperswitch
Hyperswitch is an open source, composable payments infrastructure built in Rust for managing global payment transactions. It operates as a modular platform that abstracts and unifies interactions with multiple payment, payout, fraud, vault, and tokenization providers—including Stripe, Adyen, Braintree, Worldpay, and Checkout.com—while supporting over 120 payment service providers. It lives in the fintech ecosystem and is licensed under Apache 2.0.
read the full Hyperswitch overview →
About Crater
Crater is an open source web and mobile application for tracking expenses and payments and for creating professional invoices and estimates. The web application is built with Laravel and VueJS, while the mobile applications are built with React Native. It lives in the PHP and Laravel ecosystem, is distributed under the AGPL 3.0 license, and is positioned as an open alternative to QuickBooks and FreshBooks.
read the full Crater overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Hyperswitch or Crater more popular?
Hyperswitch has 43,615 GitHub stars and Crater has 8,348. Hyperswitch has the larger community by that measure.
Are Hyperswitch and Crater free?
Both are open source. Hyperswitch is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Crater under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Hyperswitch and Crater?
Hyperswitch is written in Rust and Crater in PHP. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Hyperswitch or Crater?
Choose Hyperswitch if you want the larger community (43,615 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose Crater if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.