head to head · open source
Invidious vs sonobus
Invidious has 24,481 GitHub stars, 2,750 forks, 480 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. sonobus has 2,188 stars, 185 forks, 195 open issues and last shipped 15 days ago. Invidious leads on adoption by 1,019% (24,481 vs 2,188 stars). Invidious is written in Crystal under AGPL-3.0; sonobus is written in C++ under GPL-3.0. Invidious has attracted 11% as many forks as stars, sonobus 8%. Invidious 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
| Invidious | sonobus | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 24K | ★ 2.2K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Crystal | C++ |
| Last push | 2026-09-16 | 2026-09-04 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.8K | ⑂ 185 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Invidious if
- You weight community size — 24K stars and counting
- You want the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Crystal
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick sonobus if
- You want the sonobus feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You evaluated both and sonobus fits your workflow better
About Invidious
Invidious is an open source, AGPL 3.0 alternative front end to YouTube, written in Crystal, aimed at people who want to watch videos without ads, tracking, or a Google account.
read the full Invidious overview →
About sonobus
SonoBus is a free, GPL 3.0 licensed, low latency peer to peer audio streaming application that lets musicians, podcasters, and audio engineers send and receive high quality audio between devices over the internet or a local network.
read the full sonobus overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Invidious or sonobus more popular?
Invidious has 24,481 GitHub stars and sonobus has 2,188. Invidious has the larger community by that measure.
Are Invidious and sonobus free?
Both are open source. Invidious is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and sonobus under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Invidious and sonobus?
Invidious is written in Crystal and sonobus in C++. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Invidious or sonobus?
Choose Invidious if you want the larger community (24,481 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose sonobus if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.