head to head · open source
Insomnia vs resterm
Insomnia has 40,021 GitHub stars, 2,365 forks, 874 open issues and last shipped yesterday. resterm has 1,925 stars, 54 forks, 0 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Insomnia leads on adoption by 1,979% (40,021 vs 1,925 stars). Insomnia is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; resterm is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Insomnia has attracted 6% as many forks as stars, resterm 3%. resterm was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 5 topic tags (api-client, graphql, grpc, http-client), 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
| Insomnia | resterm | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 40K | ★ 1.9K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Go |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.4K | ⑂ 54 |
| 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 resterm if
- You want the resterm 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 resterm 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 resterm
Resterm is a terminal API client for HTTP, GraphQL, and gRPC, with WebSocket and SSE support. It lives in the developer tools and API testing ecosystem, is written in Go, and is licensed under Apache 2.0. The project stores requests as plain text .http and .rest files, so users can edit, send, diff, review, and version control API work.
read the full resterm overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Insomnia or resterm more popular?
Insomnia has 40,021 GitHub stars and resterm has 1,925. Insomnia has the larger community by that measure.
Are Insomnia and resterm free?
Both are open source. Insomnia is licensed under Apache-2.0 and resterm under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Insomnia and resterm?
Insomnia is written in TypeScript and resterm 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 resterm?
Choose Insomnia if you want the larger community (40,021 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose resterm if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.