head to head · open source
kafka vs ess-helm
kafka has 33,776 GitHub stars, 15,526 forks, 574 open issues and last shipped today. ess-helm has 957 stars, 145 forks, 24 open issues and last shipped yesterday. kafka leads on adoption by 3,429% (33,776 vs 957 stars). kafka is written in Java under Apache-2.0; ess-helm is written in Python under AGPL-3.0. kafka has attracted 46% as many forks as stars, ess-helm 15%. kafka 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
| kafka | ess-helm | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 34K | ★ 957 |
| License | Apache-2.0 | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Java | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-22 | 2026-09-21 |
| Forks | ⑂ 16K | ⑂ 145 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick kafka if
- You weight community size — 34K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick ess-helm if
- You want the ess-helm feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and ess-helm fits your workflow better
About kafka
Apache Kafka is an open source distributed event streaming platform, written in Java and Scala, for organizations that need high performance data pipelines, streaming analytics, data integration, and mission critical applications.
read the full kafka overview →
About ess-helm
ess helm is the official Element Matrix stack packaged as Helm charts — Element Server Suite Community Edition (ESS Community) — and it is aimed at non commercial community operators who want a solid Matrix deployment on Kubernetes without deep Kubernetes knowledge.
read the full ess-helm overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is kafka or ess-helm more popular?
kafka has 33,776 GitHub stars and ess-helm has 957. kafka has the larger community by that measure.
Are kafka and ess-helm free?
Both are open source. kafka is licensed under Apache-2.0 and ess-helm under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between kafka and ess-helm?
kafka is written in Java and ess-helm in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, kafka or ess-helm?
Choose kafka if you want the larger community (33,776 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose ess-helm if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.