head to head · open source
kanboard vs KaibanJS
kanboard has 9,874 GitHub stars, 1,996 forks, 160 open issues and last shipped 9 days ago. KaibanJS has 1,479 stars, 158 forks, 78 open issues and last shipped 4 months ago. kanboard leads on adoption by 568% (9,874 vs 1,479 stars). kanboard is written in PHP under MIT; KaibanJS is written in TypeScript under MIT. kanboard has attracted 20% as many forks as stars, KaibanJS 11%. kanboard was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (kanban), 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
| kanboard | KaibanJS | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 9.9K | ★ 1.5K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | PHP | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-11 | 2026-05-15 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.0K | ⑂ 158 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick kanboard if
- You weight community size — 9.9K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick KaibanJS if
- You want the KaibanJS feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and KaibanJS fits your workflow better
About kanboard
Kanboard is MIT licensed, self hosted Kanban project management software written in PHP, aimed at teams and individuals who want to run their own board based task tracking instead of renting a hosted service.
read the full kanboard overview →
About KaibanJS
KaibanJS is an MIT licensed, TypeScript written JavaScript native framework for building and managing multi agent systems with a Kanban inspired approach. It lives in the JavaScript ecosystem and provides a way to create, visualize, and coordinate AI agents, tasks, tools, and teams.
read the full KaibanJS overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is kanboard or KaibanJS more popular?
kanboard has 9,874 GitHub stars and KaibanJS has 1,479. kanboard has the larger community by that measure.
Are kanboard and KaibanJS free?
Both are open source. kanboard is licensed under MIT and KaibanJS under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between kanboard and KaibanJS?
kanboard is written in PHP and KaibanJS in TypeScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, kanboard or KaibanJS?
Choose kanboard if you want the larger community (9,874 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose KaibanJS if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.