head to head · open source

llama.cpp vs LangWatch

llama.cpp has 128,880 GitHub stars, 23,468 forks, 2,464 open issues and last shipped yesterday. LangWatch has 4,833 stars, 395 forks, 939 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. llama.cpp leads on adoption by 2,567% (128,880 vs 4,833 stars). llama.cpp is written in C++ under MIT; LangWatch is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0. llama.cpp has attracted 18% as many forks as stars, LangWatch 8%. llama.cpp 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.

llama.cpp ★ 129K LangWatch ★ 4.8K category AI & Machine Learning

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Side by side

	llama.cpp	LangWatch
GitHub stars	★ 129K	★ 4.8K
License	MIT	Apache-2.0
Written in	C++	TypeScript
Last push	2026-09-20	2026-09-19
Forks	⑂ 23K	⑂ 395
Self-hosting	Yes	Yes
Data ownership	Your server	Your server

pick llama.cpp if

You weight community size — 129K stars and counting
You want the MIT license terms
Your stack matches C++
You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance

full llama.cpp profile →

pick LangWatch if

You want the LangWatch feature set and don't need the biggest community
You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
Your stack matches TypeScript
You evaluated both and LangWatch fits your workflow better

full LangWatch profile →

About llama.cpp

llama.cpp is a C/C++ library and set of command line tools for running large language models (LLMs) and vision language models (VLMs) locally. It enables inference without external dependencies, targeting diverse hardware including Apple Silicon, x86 CPUs, NVIDIA GPUs (via CUDA), AMD GPUs (via HIP), and other accelerators. The project lives in the ggml ecosystem, leveraging the ggml tensor computation library for low level operations and quantized model execution.

read the full llama.cpp overview →

About LangWatch

LangWatch is an open source TypeScript platform for LLM evaluations and AI agent testing, licensed under Apache 2.0. It lives in the machine learning infrastructure ecosystem for teams that build LLM powered agents and need to test, simulate, evaluate, and monitor agents before release and in production.

read the full LangWatch overview →

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Frequently asked questions

Is llama.cpp or LangWatch more popular?

llama.cpp has 128,880 GitHub stars and LangWatch has 4,833. llama.cpp has the larger community by that measure.

Are llama.cpp and LangWatch free?

Both are open source. llama.cpp is licensed under MIT and LangWatch under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.

What is the difference between llama.cpp and LangWatch?

llama.cpp is written in C++ and LangWatch 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, llama.cpp or LangWatch?

Choose llama.cpp if you want the larger community (128,880 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose LangWatch if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.