head to head · open source
Jitsi vs Campfire
Jitsi has 29,931 GitHub stars, 8,026 forks, 141 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Campfire has 4,629 stars, 792 forks, 37 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. Jitsi leads on adoption by 547% (29,931 vs 4,629 stars). Jitsi is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; Campfire is written in Ruby under MIT. Jitsi has attracted 27% as many forks as stars, Campfire 17%. Jitsi 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.
← all 8884 open source comparisons
Side by side
| Jitsi | Campfire | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 30K | ★ 4.6K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Ruby |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-14 |
| Forks | ⑂ 8.0K | ⑂ 792 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Jitsi if
- You weight community size — 30K 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 Campfire if
- You want the Campfire feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Ruby
- You evaluated both and Campfire fits your workflow better
About Jitsi
Jitsi Meet is an open source video conferencing platform built on WebRTC standards, designed for privacy focused, account free video calls. It operates as a standalone web application or embeddable component, supporting both browser based and native mobile usage without requiring user accounts to join meetings. The project lives in the video communication ecosystem, competing directly with proprietary services like Zoom, Google Meet, and Slack’s built in calling.
read the full Jitsi overview →
About Campfire
Campfire is a web based group chat application in the Business Software / Collaboration & Communication category. It is written in Ruby, released under the MIT license, and presented as a self hosted service that avoids recurring subscription fees. The project lives in the Ruby and Docker self hosting ecosystem, with its homepage at https://once.com/campfire and its published Docker image at ghcr.io/basecamp/once campfire:latest.
read the full Campfire overview →
More in Business Software
Related comparisons
More Collaboration & Communication projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Collaboration & Communication field.
Frequently asked questions
Is Jitsi or Campfire more popular?
Jitsi has 29,931 GitHub stars and Campfire has 4,629. Jitsi has the larger community by that measure.
Are Jitsi and Campfire free?
Both are open source. Jitsi is licensed under Apache-2.0 and Campfire under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Jitsi and Campfire?
Jitsi is written in TypeScript and Campfire in Ruby. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Jitsi or Campfire?
Choose Jitsi if you want the larger community (29,931 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose Campfire if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.