head to head · open source
Insomnia vs aws-sam-cli
Insomnia has 40,111 GitHub stars, 2,388 forks, 874 open issues and last shipped yesterday. aws-sam-cli has 6,740 stars, 1,257 forks, 535 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Insomnia leads on adoption by 495% (40,111 vs 6,740 stars). Insomnia is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; aws-sam-cli is written in Python under Apache-2.0. Insomnia has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, aws-sam-cli 19%. 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 | aws-sam-cli | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 40K | ★ 6.7K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Python |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.4K | ⑂ 1.3K |
| 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 aws-sam-cli if
- You want the aws-sam-cli feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and aws-sam-cli 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 aws-sam-cli
AWS SAM CLI Installation Blogs Videos AWS Docs Roadmap Try It Out Slack Us The AWS Serverless Application Model (SAM) CLI is an open source CLI tool that helps you develop serverless applications containing Lambda functions, Step Functions, API Gateway, EventBridge, SQS, SNS and more. Some of the features it provides are: Initialize serverless applications in minutes with AWS provided infrastructure templates with sam init Compile, build, and package Lambda functions with provided runtimes and with custom Makefile workflows, for zip and image types of Lambda functions with sam build Locally test a Lambda…
read the full aws-sam-cli overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Insomnia or aws-sam-cli more popular?
Insomnia has 40,111 GitHub stars and aws-sam-cli has 6,740. Insomnia has the larger community by that measure.
Are Insomnia and aws-sam-cli free?
Both are open source. Insomnia is licensed under Apache-2.0 and aws-sam-cli under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Insomnia and aws-sam-cli?
Insomnia is written in TypeScript and aws-sam-cli in Python. 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 aws-sam-cli?
Choose Insomnia if you want the larger community (40,111 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose aws-sam-cli if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.