head to head · open source
Ladybird vs ego-lite
Ladybird has 66,237 GitHub stars, 3,163 forks, 535 open issues and last shipped yesterday. ego-lite has 16,117 stars, 844 forks, 169 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Ladybird leads on adoption by 311% (66,237 vs 16,117 stars). Ladybird is written in C++ under BSD-2-Clause; ego-lite is written in JavaScript under MIT. Ladybird has attracted 5% as many forks as stars, ego-lite 5%. Ladybird was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (browser), 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
| Ladybird | ego-lite | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 66K | ★ 16K |
| License | BSD-2-Clause | MIT |
| Written in | C++ | JavaScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 3.2K | ⑂ 844 |
| 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 ego-lite if
- You want the ego-lite feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You evaluated both and ego-lite 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 ego-lite
ego lite is an MIT licensed browser from citrolabs that lets a person and their AI agents drive the same browser in parallel, aimed at developers who want Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, or a custom agent CLI to automate real, logged in web pages without surrendering the tabs they are using.
read the full ego-lite overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Ladybird or ego-lite more popular?
Ladybird has 66,237 GitHub stars and ego-lite has 16,117. Ladybird has the larger community by that measure.
Are Ladybird and ego-lite free?
Both are open source. Ladybird is licensed under BSD-2-Clause and ego-lite under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Ladybird and ego-lite?
Ladybird is written in C++ and ego-lite 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 ego-lite?
Choose Ladybird if you want the larger community (66,237 stars) or its BSD-2-Clause licence terms. Choose ego-lite if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.