head to head · open source
langchain vs langgraph
langchain has 146,538 GitHub stars, 24,504 forks, 492 open issues and last shipped yesterday. langgraph has 41,841 stars, 7,065 forks, 786 open issues and last shipped yesterday. langchain leads on adoption by 250% (146,538 vs 41,841 stars). langchain is written in Python under MIT; langgraph is written in Python under MIT. langchain has attracted 17% as many forks as stars, langgraph 17%. langchain was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 11 topic tags (agents, ai, ai-agents, chatgpt), 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
| langchain | langgraph | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 147K | ★ 42K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | Python | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-17 |
| Forks | ⑂ 25K | ⑂ 7.1K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick langchain if
- You weight community size — 147K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick langgraph if
- You want the langgraph feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and langgraph fits your workflow better
About langchain
LangChain is an open source framework for building agents and LLM powered applications, written in Python and released under the MIT license. It lives in the AI and machine learning ecosystem, specifically among AI development platforms, and it works by chaining together interoperable components and third party integrations so that AI application development becomes simpler. The project describes itself as the agent engineering platform, and its abstractions are designed to keep applications working as the underlying technology evolves.
read the full langchain overview →
About langgraph
LangGraph is a low level Python orchestration framework for building stateful, long running agents, aimed at developers and platform teams who need durable execution, human in the loop control, and persistent memory instead of a turnkey agent application.
read the full langgraph overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is langchain or langgraph more popular?
langchain has 146,538 GitHub stars and langgraph has 41,841. langchain has the larger community by that measure.
Are langchain and langgraph free?
Both are open source. langchain is licensed under MIT and langgraph under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between langchain and langgraph?
langchain is written in Python and langgraph 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, langchain or langgraph?
Choose langchain if you want the larger community (146,538 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose langgraph if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.