head to head · open source
mall vs aleph
mall has 84,789 GitHub stars, 29,826 forks, 15 open issues and last shipped 3 days ago. aleph has 2,432 stars, 362 forks, 371 open issues and last shipped 7 months ago. mall leads on adoption by 3,386% (84,789 vs 2,432 stars). mall is written in Java under Apache-2.0; aleph is written in JavaScript under MIT. mall has attracted 35% as many forks as stars, aleph 15%. mall 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
| mall | aleph | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 85K | ★ 2.4K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Java | JavaScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-15 | 2026-02-20 |
| Forks | ⑂ 30K | ⑂ 362 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick mall if
- You weight community size — 85K 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 aleph if
- You want the aleph feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches JavaScript
- You evaluated both and aleph fits your workflow better
About mall
mall is a complete e commerce system built on Spring Boot and MyBatis, distributed as a Java project under the Apache 2.0 license. It ships two applications in one repository: a storefront system for shoppers and an administrative back office for operators. The storefront covers the home portal, product recommendation, product search, product display, shopping cart, order flow, member center, customer service, and help center. The back office covers product management, order management, member management, promotion management, operations management, content management, statistics reports, finance management, perm…
About aleph
Aleph is an MIT licensed open source search and browsing tool for large collections of documents and structured data. It indexes PDF, Word, HTML, CSV, XLS, and SQL inputs so users can search mixed evidence sources in one tool. The project lives in the open source data search, graph database, investigative journalism, and OSINT ecosystem, and it is built with investigative reporting as a primary use case.
read the full aleph overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is mall or aleph more popular?
mall has 84,789 GitHub stars and aleph has 2,432. mall has the larger community by that measure.
Are mall and aleph free?
Both are open source. mall is licensed under Apache-2.0 and aleph under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between mall and aleph?
mall is written in Java and aleph 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, mall or aleph?
Choose mall if you want the larger community (84,789 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose aleph if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.