head to head · open source
llama_index vs burr
llama_index has 52,779 GitHub stars, 8,500 forks, 770 open issues and last shipped 8 days ago. burr has 2,589 stars, 215 forks, 99 open issues and last shipped yesterday. llama_index leads on adoption by 1,939% (52,779 vs 2,589 stars). llama_index is written in Python under MIT; burr is written in Python under Apache-2.0. llama_index has attracted 16% as many forks as stars, burr 8%. burr 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
| llama_index | burr | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 53K | ★ 2.6K |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | Python | Python |
| Last push | 2026-10-26 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 8.5K | ⑂ 215 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick llama_index if
- You weight community size — 53K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick burr if
- You want the burr feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and burr fits your workflow better
About llama_index
🗂️ LlamaIndex (OSS Framework) 🦙 [!NOTE] The current focus of LlamaIndex is to build the best AI powered engine for document parsing and extraction. LlamaParse is our enterprise platform for agentic OCR, parsing, extraction, indexing and more. LiteParse represents our efforts to build the best free, fast, cheap text parser in the market. ParseBench and ExtractBench represent our commitment towards open benchmarking for parsing and extraction. The company itself has undergone an evolution since when this OSS framework first launched 3 years ago in 2023. Since the early days, the framework has consisted of a…
read the full llama_index overview →
About burr
Apache Burr (incubating) Apache Burr (incubating) makes it easy to develop applications that make decisions (chatbots, agents, simulations, etc...) from simple python building blocks. Apache Burr works well for any application that uses LLMs, and can integrate with any of your favorite frameworks. Burr includes a UI that can track/monitor/trace your system in real time, along with pluggable persisters (e.g. for memory) to save & load application state. Link to documentation. Quick ( [!NOTE] In version 0.43.0, the optional CLI included with [start] , [learn] , and [cli] requires Python 3.10+. Core library usage…
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Frequently asked questions
Is llama_index or burr more popular?
llama_index has 52,779 GitHub stars and burr has 2,589. llama_index has the larger community by that measure.
Are llama_index and burr free?
Both are open source. llama_index is licensed under MIT and burr under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between llama_index and burr?
llama_index is written in Python and burr 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, llama_index or burr?
Choose llama_index if you want the larger community (52,779 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose burr if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.