head to head · open source
Insomnia vs apitest
Insomnia has 40,111 GitHub stars, 2,388 forks, 874 open issues and last shipped yesterday. apitest has 845 stars, 59 forks, 0 open issues and last shipped 7 days ago. Insomnia leads on adoption by 4,647% (40,111 vs 845 stars). Insomnia is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; apitest is written in Go under MIT. Insomnia has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, apitest 7%. Insomnia 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
| Insomnia | apitest | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 40K | ★ 845 |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-10-27 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.4K | ⑂ 59 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Insomnia if
- You weight community size — 40K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick apitest if
- You want the apitest feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and apitest fits your workflow better
About Insomnia
Insomnia API Client Insomnia is an open source, cross platform API client for GraphQL, REST, WebSockets, Server Sent Events (SSE), gRPC and any other HTTP compatible protocol. With Insomnia you can: Debug APIs using the most popular protocols and formats. Design APIs using the native OpenAPI editor and visual preview. Test APIs using native test suites and collection runner. Mock APIs using a cloud or self hosted mocking server. Build CI/CD pipelines using the native Insomnia CLI for linting and testing. Collaborate with others using the many collaboration features. And more including the ability to use 3rd…
read the full Insomnia overview →
About apitest
apitest A simple and extensible behavioural testing library for Go HTTP services. Tests are written the way a client uses the API: build a request, send it to the handler, and assert on the response. External HTTP calls can be mocked, and every test can render a sequence diagram of what happened. In behavioural tests the internal structure of the app is not known by the tests. Data is input to the system and the outputs are expected to meet certain conditions. Fluent builders for requests and expectations Works with anything that implements http.Handler , or against a running server Declarative mocks for…
read the full apitest overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Insomnia or apitest more popular?
Insomnia has 40,111 GitHub stars and apitest has 845. Insomnia has the larger community by that measure.
Are Insomnia and apitest free?
Both are open source. Insomnia is licensed under Apache-2.0 and apitest under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Insomnia and apitest?
Insomnia is written in TypeScript and apitest in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Insomnia or apitest?
Choose Insomnia if you want the larger community (40,111 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose apitest if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.