head to head · open source
Invidious vs tvheadend
Invidious has 24,469 GitHub stars, 2,746 forks, 480 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. tvheadend has 3,521 stars, 975 forks, 107 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. Invidious leads on adoption by 595% (24,469 vs 3,521 stars). Invidious is written in Crystal under AGPL-3.0; tvheadend is written in C under GPL-3.0. Invidious has attracted 11% as many forks as stars, tvheadend 28%. 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 | tvheadend | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 24K | ★ 3.5K |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Crystal | C |
| Last push | 2026-09-16 | 2026-09-14 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.7K | ⑂ 975 |
| 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 tvheadend if
- You want the tvheadend 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 tvheadend 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 tvheadend
Tvheadend is an open source TV streaming server and digital video recorder for Linux. It lives in the Linux media and streaming ecosystem, and it is written in C under the GPL 3.0 license. The project provides a server that can receive television signals and streams from many input types, then make those channels available over the network.
read the full tvheadend overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Invidious or tvheadend more popular?
Invidious has 24,469 GitHub stars and tvheadend has 3,521. Invidious has the larger community by that measure.
Are Invidious and tvheadend free?
Both are open source. Invidious is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and tvheadend under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Invidious and tvheadend?
Invidious is written in Crystal and tvheadend 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 tvheadend?
Choose Invidious if you want the larger community (24,469 stars) or its AGPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose tvheadend if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.