head to head · open source
Orca vs Kodus
Orca has 72,812 GitHub stars, 4,763 forks, 5,801 open issues and last shipped today. Kodus has 1,407 stars, 153 forks, 100 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Orca leads on adoption by 5,075% (72,812 vs 1,407 stars). Orca is written in TypeScript under MIT; Kodus is written in TypeScript under a custom or non-standard licence. Orca has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, Kodus 11%. Orca was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (ai-agents), 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
| Orca | Kodus | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 73K | ★ 1.4K |
| License | MIT | Custom / other |
| Written in | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-20 | 2026-09-19 |
| Forks | ⑂ 4.8K | ⑂ 153 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Orca if
- You weight community size — 73K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Kodus if
- You want the Kodus feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and Kodus fits your workflow better
About Orca
Orca is an agent desktop environment (ADE) that runs multiple AI coding agents in parallel, each in its own isolated git worktree. It unifies workflow, monitoring, and collaboration around AI assisted coding across desktop, mobile, and remote runtimes. Built for developers who rely on several AI coding tools simultaneously, Orca eliminates context switching by tracking all agents and their outputs in one place.
About Kodus
Kodus is an AI code review tool for teams that integrates with GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, and Azure Repos. It lives in the Developer Tools / AI Assisted Coding ecosystem and is distributed as a TypeScript monorepo. The project centers on Kody, an AI agent that reviews pull requests, flags risks by severity, and suggests fixes inside the normal review workflow.
read the full Kodus overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Orca or Kodus more popular?
Orca has 72,812 GitHub stars and Kodus has 1,407. Orca has the larger community by that measure.
Are Orca and Kodus free?
Both are open source. Orca is licensed under MIT, and Kodus has no licence declared in this registry. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between Orca and Kodus?
Orca is written in TypeScript and Kodus 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, Orca or Kodus?
Choose Orca if you want the larger community (72,812 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose Kodus if its feature set, stack or Custom / other licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.