head to head · open source
lighthouse vs pwndoc
lighthouse has 30,785 GitHub stars, 9,765 forks, 470 open issues and last shipped yesterday. pwndoc has 2,895 stars, 519 forks, 122 open issues and last shipped 8 days ago. lighthouse leads on adoption by 963% (30,785 vs 2,895 stars). lighthouse is written in JavaScript under Apache-2.0; pwndoc is written in JavaScript under MIT. lighthouse has attracted 32% as many forks as stars, pwndoc 18%. lighthouse was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (audit), 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
| lighthouse | pwndoc | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 31K | ★ 2.9K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | JavaScript | JavaScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-10 |
| Forks | ⑂ 9.8K | ⑂ 519 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick lighthouse if
- You weight community size — 31K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick pwndoc if
- You want the pwndoc feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You evaluated both and pwndoc fits your workflow better
About lighthouse
Lighthouse is an open source, automated auditing tool for web applications and web pages. It analyzes a target URL and collects modern performance metrics alongside insights into developer best practices, producing a structured report that scores and explains what it finds. The project lives in the JavaScript ecosystem, is distributed under the Apache 2.0 license, and is maintained under the GoogleChrome organization. It has been developed for roughly eleven years and is published to npm as the lighthouse package.
read the full lighthouse overview →
About pwndoc
PwnDoc is a JavaScript pentest reporting application released under the MIT license. It lives in the information security and penetration testing ecosystem, and it is positioned as a tool for audit work, vulnerability reporting, and compliance or risk management workflows. The project describes itself as a pentest report generator, with the stated aim of helping users spend more time testing and less time documenting by sharing data such as vulnerabilities among users.
read the full pwndoc overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is lighthouse or pwndoc more popular?
lighthouse has 30,785 GitHub stars and pwndoc has 2,895. lighthouse has the larger community by that measure.
Are lighthouse and pwndoc free?
Both are open source. lighthouse is licensed under Apache-2.0 and pwndoc under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between lighthouse and pwndoc?
lighthouse is written in JavaScript and pwndoc 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, lighthouse or pwndoc?
Choose lighthouse if you want the larger community (30,785 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose pwndoc if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.