head to head · open source
seatunnel vs Lightdash
seatunnel has 9,657 GitHub stars, 2,416 forks, 705 open issues and last shipped today. Lightdash has 6,145 stars, 777 forks, 1,018 open issues and last shipped today. seatunnel leads on adoption by 57% (9,657 vs 6,145 stars). seatunnel is written in Java under Apache-2.0; Lightdash is written in TypeScript under a custom or non-standard licence. seatunnel has attracted 25% as many forks as stars, Lightdash 13%. Lightdash 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.
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Side by side
| seatunnel | Lightdash | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 9.7K | ★ 6.1K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Custom / other |
| Written in | Java | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-20 | 2026-09-20 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.4K | ⑂ 777 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick seatunnel if
- You weight community size — 9.7K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick Lightdash if
- You want the Lightdash feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Custom / other license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and Lightdash fits your workflow better
About seatunnel
Apache SeaTunnel is a multimodal, high performance, distributed data integration tool that is capable of synchronizing vast amounts of data daily. It is an Apache Software Foundation project written in Java and released under the Apache 2.0 license, with a home on the web at seatunnel.apache.org. The project has been in development for roughly nine years and has accumulated 9,652 stars and 2,407 forks on GitHub. It sits in the Data & Analytics ecosystem, specifically in data engineering and integration, and it is built around a connector driven model: sources, sinks, and transforms are configured as jobs, and tho…
read the full seatunnel overview →
About Lightdash
Lightdash is an open source, agentic business intelligence platform for modern data teams, written in TypeScript and distributed under a NOASSERTION license. It lives in the data and analytics ecosystem, specifically the data engineering and integration space, and it is built around dbt and warehouse native workflows. The project describes itself as agentic BI, meaning analytics is intended to move at the speed of code rather than through point and click configuration alone.
read the full Lightdash overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is seatunnel or Lightdash more popular?
seatunnel has 9,657 GitHub stars and Lightdash has 6,145. seatunnel has the larger community by that measure.
Are seatunnel and Lightdash free?
Both are open source. seatunnel is licensed under Apache-2.0, and Lightdash has no licence declared in this registry. Both are free to self-host.
What is the difference between seatunnel and Lightdash?
seatunnel is written in Java and Lightdash 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, seatunnel or Lightdash?
Choose seatunnel if you want the larger community (9,657 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose Lightdash if its feature set, stack or Custom / other licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.