head to head · open source
Kestra vs agent-framework
Kestra has 30,122 GitHub stars, 3,495 forks, 713 open issues and last shipped yesterday. agent-framework has 14,499 stars, 2,558 forks, 617 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Kestra leads on adoption by 108% (30,122 vs 14,499 stars). Kestra is written in Java under Apache-2.0; agent-framework is written in Python under MIT. Kestra has attracted 12% as many forks as stars, agent-framework 18%. agent-framework 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
| Kestra | agent-framework | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 30K | ★ 14K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Java | Python |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.5K | ⑂ 2.6K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Kestra if
- You weight community size — 30K 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 agent-framework if
- You want the agent-framework feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and agent-framework fits your workflow better
About Kestra
Open source orchestration platform for data, AI, and infrastructure workflows Click on the image to learn how to get started with Kestra in 3 minutes. 🌟 What is Kestra? Kestra is an open source, event driven orchestration platform for data, AI, and infrastructure workflows. It unifies scheduled and event driven automation behind a declarative, language agnostic interface. By bringing Infrastructure as Code best practices to your data, process, and microservice pipelines, you can build reliable workflows directly from the UI in just a few lines of YAML, let the built in AI Copilot write them for you, or generate…
read the full Kestra overview →
About agent-framework
Welcome to Microsoft Agent Framework! Microsoft Agent Framework (MAF) is an open, multi language framework for building production grade AI agents and multi agent workflows in .NET and Python . Microsoft Agent Framework is built for teams taking agents from prototype to production. It provides a consistent foundation for building, orchestrating, and operating agent systems across Python, .NET and Go, while keeping architecture choices open as requirements evolve, and supports a broad ecosystem including Microsoft Foundry, Azure OpenAI, OpenAI, and the GitHub Copilot SDK, with samples and hosting patterns for…
read the full agent-framework overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Kestra or agent-framework more popular?
Kestra has 30,122 GitHub stars and agent-framework has 14,499. Kestra has the larger community by that measure.
Are Kestra and agent-framework free?
Both are open source. Kestra is licensed under Apache-2.0 and agent-framework under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Kestra and agent-framework?
Kestra is written in Java and agent-framework 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, Kestra or agent-framework?
Choose Kestra if you want the larger community (30,122 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose agent-framework if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.