head to head · open source
Insomnia vs prest
Insomnia has 40,111 GitHub stars, 2,388 forks, 874 open issues and last shipped yesterday. prest has 4,630 stars, 324 forks, 153 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. Insomnia leads on adoption by 766% (40,111 vs 4,630 stars). Insomnia is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; prest is written in Go under MIT. Insomnia has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, prest 7%. Insomnia was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (api), 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.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| Insomnia | prest | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 40K | ★ 4.6K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-10-30 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.4K | ⑂ 324 |
| 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 prest if
- You want the prest feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and prest 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 prest
pRESTd p REST ( P ostgreSQL REST ) is a production ready API that delivers instant REST and Model Context Protocol (MCP) APIs on top of your existing or new Postgres database—CRUD, custom SQL routes, auth, ACL, and a read only MCP endpoint—without hand writing a backend. PostgreSQL version 9.5 or higher Contributor License Agreement — Documentation Full documentation lives at docs.prestd.com. Quick start Install and run options (Docker, Homebrew, or Go) are documented in Get pREST. Point pREST at Postgres ( PREST PG URL or pg. / DATABASE URL ), then call: See Configuring pREST for auth, ACL, custom queries, and…
read the full prest overview →
More in Developer Tools
Related comparisons
More API Development & Testing projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the API Development & Testing field.
Frequently asked questions
Is Insomnia or prest more popular?
Insomnia has 40,111 GitHub stars and prest has 4,630. Insomnia has the larger community by that measure.
Are Insomnia and prest free?
Both are open source. Insomnia is licensed under Apache-2.0 and prest under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Insomnia and prest?
Insomnia is written in TypeScript and prest 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 prest?
Choose Insomnia if you want the larger community (40,111 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose prest if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.