head to head · open source
imgui vs Excalibur
imgui has 76,934 GitHub stars, 12,107 forks, 1,227 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Excalibur has 2,361 stars, 228 forks, 36 open issues and last shipped yesterday. imgui leads on adoption by 3,159% (76,934 vs 2,361 stars). imgui is written in C++ under MIT; Excalibur is written in TypeScript under BSD-2-Clause. imgui has attracted 16% as many forks as stars, Excalibur 10%. Excalibur was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (game-development, game-engine, gamedev), 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
| imgui | Excalibur | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 77K | ★ 2.4K |
| License | MIT | BSD-2-Clause |
| Written in | C++ | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 12K | ⑂ 228 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick imgui if
- You weight community size — 77K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Excalibur if
- You want the Excalibur feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the BSD-2-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and Excalibur fits your workflow better
About imgui
Dear ImGui ===== "Give someone state and they'll have a bug one day, but teach them how to represent state in two separate locations that have to be kept in sync and they'll have bugs for a lifetime." ryg (This library is available under a free and permissive license, but needs financial support to sustain its continued improvements. In addition to maintenance and stability there are many desirable features yet to be added. If your company is using Dear ImGui, please consider reaching out.) Businesses: support continued development and maintenance via invoiced sponsoring/support contracts: E mail: contact @…
read the full imgui overview →
About Excalibur
[![Discord][discord badge]][discord url] [discord badge]: [discord url]: Excalibur is a free game engine written in TypeScript for making 2D games in HTML5 canvas. Our goal is to make it easier for you to create 2D HTML/JS games, whether you're new to game development or you're an experienced game developer. We take care of all of the boilerplate engine code, cross platform targeting (using browserstack 😎), and more! Use as much or as little as you need! Excalibur is an open source project licensed under the 2 clause BSD license (this means you can use it in commercial projects!). It's free and always will be…
read the full Excalibur overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is imgui or Excalibur more popular?
imgui has 76,934 GitHub stars and Excalibur has 2,361. imgui has the larger community by that measure.
Are imgui and Excalibur free?
Both are open source. imgui is licensed under MIT and Excalibur under BSD-2-Clause. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between imgui and Excalibur?
imgui is written in C++ and Excalibur 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, imgui or Excalibur?
Choose imgui if you want the larger community (76,934 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose Excalibur if its feature set, stack or BSD-2-Clause licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.