head to head · open source
Ladybird vs duckduckgo-privacy-extension
Ladybird has 66,240 GitHub stars, 3,162 forks, 535 open issues and last shipped today. duckduckgo-privacy-extension has 1,494 stars, 333 forks, 198 open issues and last shipped 7 days ago. Ladybird leads on adoption by 4,334% (66,240 vs 1,494 stars). Ladybird is written in C++ under BSD-2-Clause; duckduckgo-privacy-extension is written in JavaScript under Apache-2.0. Ladybird has attracted 5% as many forks as stars, duckduckgo-privacy-extension 22%. Ladybird 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.
← all 8884 open source comparisons
Side by side
| Ladybird | duckduckgo-privacy-extension | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 66K | ★ 1.5K |
| License | BSD-2-Clause | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | C++ | JavaScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-11 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.2K | ⑂ 333 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Ladybird if
- You weight community size — 66K stars and counting
- You want the BSD-2-Clause license terms
- Your stack matches C++
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick duckduckgo-privacy-extension if
- You want the duckduckgo-privacy-extension feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You evaluated both and duckduckgo-privacy-extension fits your workflow better
About Ladybird
Ladybird is a truly independent web browser and browser engine, written from scratch in C++ rather than as a fork of any existing engine, and it is built for developers who want to work on a browser engine based on web standards while it remains in a pre alpha state.
read the full Ladybird overview →
About duckduckgo-privacy-extension
DuckDuckGo Browser Extensions DuckDuckGo Firefox, Chrome, and Edge extensions. Visit our Web Tracking Protections page to learn how each of our web tracking protections works and how they work together in our browser extensions and apps to provide overlapping protection. DuckDuckGo Privacy Extensions is distributed under the Apache 2.0 License. Latest Versions Firefox Chrome Edge Opera Safari The code for the Safari extension is an Xcode project which you can find here. The Safari extension can be installed from the App Store. Other browsers If you use another Chromium based browser like Vivaldi, you can usually …
read the full duckduckgo-privacy-extension overview →
More in Productivity & Utilities
Related comparisons
More Browsers & Extensions projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Browsers & Extensions field.
Frequently asked questions
Is Ladybird or duckduckgo-privacy-extension more popular?
Ladybird has 66,240 GitHub stars and duckduckgo-privacy-extension has 1,494. Ladybird has the larger community by that measure.
Are Ladybird and duckduckgo-privacy-extension free?
Both are open source. Ladybird is licensed under BSD-2-Clause and duckduckgo-privacy-extension under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Ladybird and duckduckgo-privacy-extension?
Ladybird is written in C++ and duckduckgo-privacy-extension in JavaScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Ladybird or duckduckgo-privacy-extension?
Choose Ladybird if you want the larger community (66,240 stars) or its BSD-2-Clause licence terms. Choose duckduckgo-privacy-extension if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.