head to head · open source
Joplin vs marksman
Joplin has 56,442 GitHub stars, 6,298 forks, 637 open issues and last shipped yesterday. marksman has 3,343 stars, 72 forks, 134 open issues and last shipped 6 days ago. Joplin leads on adoption by 1,588% (56,442 vs 3,343 stars). Joplin is written in TypeScript under a custom or non-standard licence; marksman is written in F# under MIT. Joplin has attracted 11% as many forks as stars, marksman 2%. Joplin was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (note-taking), 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
| Joplin | marksman | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 56K | ★ 3.3K |
| License | Custom / other | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | F# |
| Last push | 2026-09-19 | 2026-09-14 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.3K | ⑂ 72 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Joplin if
- You weight community size — 56K stars and counting
- You want the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick marksman if
- You want the marksman feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches F#
- You evaluated both and marksman fits your workflow better
About Joplin
Joplin is a free, open source, privacy focused note taking and to do application that keeps notes as Markdown on your own device and synchronises them, end to end encrypted, across Windows, macOS, Linux, Android and iOS.
read the full Joplin overview →
About marksman
Marksman is an MIT licensed Markdown language server, written in F , that brings code assist features such as completion, go to definition, find references, rename refactoring and diagnostics into any editor that speaks the Language Server Protocol, and it is aimed at writers and note takers who maintain Markdown documents and Zettelkasten style wikilink notes.
read the full marksman overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Joplin or marksman more popular?
Joplin has 56,442 GitHub stars and marksman has 3,343. Joplin has the larger community by that measure.
Are Joplin and marksman free?
Both are open source. Joplin has no licence declared in this registry, and marksman is licensed under MIT. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Joplin and marksman?
Joplin is written in TypeScript and marksman in F#. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Joplin or marksman?
Choose Joplin if you want the larger community (56,442 stars) or its Custom / other licence terms. Choose marksman if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.