head to head · open source
Insomnia vs oasdiff
Insomnia has 40,023 GitHub stars, 2,367 forks, 874 open issues and last shipped today. oasdiff has 1,371 stars, 107 forks, 50 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. Insomnia leads on adoption by 2,819% (40,023 vs 1,371 stars). Insomnia is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; oasdiff is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Insomnia has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, oasdiff 8%. 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 | oasdiff | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 40K | ★ 1.4K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-20 | 2026-09-18 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.4K | ⑂ 107 |
| 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 oasdiff if
- You want the oasdiff feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and oasdiff fits your workflow better
About Insomnia
Insomnia is an open source, cross platform API client built with Electron and TypeScript for developing and testing APIs across multiple protocols including REST, GraphQL, WebSockets, SSE, and gRPC. It runs on macOS, Windows, and Linux and is distributed under the Apache 2.0 license. The project serves as a direct open source alternative to Postman, offering similar core functionality without vendor lock in or mandatory cloud usage.
read the full Insomnia overview →
About oasdiff
oasdiff is a Go based, Apache 2.0 command line tool that compares OpenAPI specifications and detects breaking changes, built for API engineers and platform teams who need to know whether a spec edit will break existing API clients before it ships.
read the full oasdiff overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Insomnia or oasdiff more popular?
Insomnia has 40,023 GitHub stars and oasdiff has 1,371. Insomnia has the larger community by that measure.
Are Insomnia and oasdiff free?
Both are open source. Insomnia is licensed under Apache-2.0 and oasdiff under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Insomnia and oasdiff?
Insomnia is written in TypeScript and oasdiff 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 oasdiff?
Choose Insomnia if you want the larger community (40,023 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose oasdiff if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.